Putin meets with Russian military moms — but not the ones criticizing the war mobilization
CBC
When Russian President Vladimir Putin sat at a table with more than a dozen military mothers outside Moscow on Friday, he expressed sympathy for the women who had lost loved ones fighting in Ukraine.
But he also urged the group not to believe the "fake" news they see on the internet or television.
His pre-recorded meeting with a select group of women hand-picked by the Kremlin was a deliberate move to try and show that Putin understands the plight of hundreds of thousands of Russian families whose sons, husbands and brothers were drafted to fight in Ukraine.
At the same time, the spectacle was an attempt to discredit rampant criticism about the country's military and a mobilization process that many say was deeply flawed and ended up sending poorly trained, ill-equipped troops to their deaths in Ukraine.
As they sat gathered around a table set with tea and cakes, Putin told the group "we share your pain" and that he called the meeting ahead of when Russia celebrates Mothers Day, on Nov. 27, because he wants to hear the women's "opinions, ideas and suggestions."
Left off the guest list were women who have been publicly demanding to speak to Russia's military leadership about the draft — and, in some cases, learn the whereabouts of men they say were sent to Ukraine and have not been heard from since.
"We have questions, but we don't get answers," said Olga Tsukanova, co-head of the Council of Mothers and Wives. She spoke to CBC on the phone before agreeing to an in-person interview in Moscow with a freelance camera person hired by CBC.
Her grassroots group has been petitioning the Russian government for weeks, urging officials to address their concerns around a mobilization drive that saw 300,000 men drafted this fall, with a third of them already sent into combat, according to officials.
Tsukanova, who lives in Samara, about 1,000 kilometres southeast of Moscow, got involved after successfully battling to keep her son out of Ukraine, and was contacted by other women looking for help.
She has made public appeals, along with other women who have recorded videos that are circulating on social media.
CBC hasn't been able to verify the videos, which have appeared on Russian social media sites SOTA and Verska, and are also widely circulated by Ukrainian and Western social media accounts.
After the Kremlin announced it was convening a meeting of mothers, Tsukanova stated that the invitees — who she was not in contact with — would simply ask "questions that would be agreed [on] beforehand."
Tsukanova called out Putin personally on one of her social media accounts, asking if he was a man and had the "courage to meet us face to face…. not with pre-agreed women and mothers who are in your pocket."
She believes speaking out has made her a target, and says that in recent days she has been trailed and surveilled by a number of men.
