20,000 Young Men Will Be Recruited in Reservist Army on March 31

After March 31, Georgian males will be asked to enlist in a military reserve. The law on “Military Reservist Service” requires men from ages 27 to 40 to enlist. Among these are those who have already served in the army. There are fifteen exclusions in the law.

This year, four reservist units will be set up in Senaki, Telavi, Kojori and Vaziani. Out of the eligible population, which numbers around 300,000, 20,000 will be enlisted into the military reserve.

There are three sorts of reserve: active, national and individual. Article 3 of the draft law identifies where each reservist should serve. “Those people will join the active reserve who have been released from military service after having been recruited into a military reserve; the national reservist army will be joined by conscripts according to their administrative-territorial units…”

The Mobilization Department of the Georgian Defense Ministry will recruit for the military reserve. The term of the reservist service will be added to the labor record of the soldier. Besides that, the job and the salary of the reservist must be maintained.

The age of the reservist is from 27 to 40. An older person can join the army according to his wish. A person should serve his term in the army once a year for 18 days.

The following groups are not obliged to join the army: women, railway transport personnel, sea fleet personnel, teachers and doctors who work in the villages, employees of the Internal Ministry and the Defense Ministry, personnel of the metropolitan, judges, people who are abroad to work or to study, high-ranking diplomats, religious figures, MPs.

The draft law envisages the postponing of the military service if the person is a bread winner for disabled parents or younger siblings.

Article 11 deals with the avoidance of the military reserve service and states that a person who avoids service will be punished. Georgian Criminal Code Article 390 stipulates one-year imprisonment for avoiding service through deception, such as imitating illness or falsifying documents.

Under the Article 389, desertion is punishable from three to seven years imprisonment. The same crime committed in conspiracy is punishable from 5 to 10 years imprisonment.

MP Giga Bukia said that the sanctions are too strict and cannot exclude the possibility of corrupt arrangements.

Giga Bukia: “You know that the first stage of recruiting will start on March 31. Currently, it is settled that 20,000 men will be recruited into an army this year. Next year their number will increase up to 40,000, and eventually their total number should reach 100,000.  Unfortunately, the Parliament did not take our opinions into consideration. When the total number of eligible is 300,000 men and only 20,000 will be recruited, it means that recruiting will be carried out according to some sort of draft. The draft method has not been worked out, yet. They could call all 300,000 and [ask for bribes from 280,000 of these].

As for the sanctions, they are very strict. Initially, 1,000 GEL was envisaged as the fine for avoidance. Later it was reduced to 500 GEL… Besides that a student who joins the reservist army three times will be given a military certificate. Thus, having served for 54 days in the military, he will be considered to have fulfilled his service duty. This is not right. The total term for military service should be 18 months.

A large number of students were put on the first list of eligible reservists.  Their selection ended at high schools several months ago.

Eka Gulua