Zelensky signs law lowering draft age to 25 in bid to boost military ranks

KYIV — Ukrainian men as young as 25 can now be conscripted into military service after President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a new law Tuesday lowering the draft age — a bid to replenish Kyiv’s badly depleted troop ranks more than two years into Russia’s invasion.

Lowering the conscription age, which had been 27, was the most significant measure in a mobilization draft bill that has already seen thousands of amendments in parliament since the start of this year. Although citizens can voluntarily join the military starting at age 18, and men between 18 and 60 are banned from leaving the country under martial law, the draft has until now protected younger men — many of whom are students — from being forcibly mobilized.