Ukrainian Men Abroad Protest Against Consular Service Suspension

Ukrainian men were protesting outside the Ukrainian passport service in Poland’s capital Warsaw Wednesday against the suspension of consular services – including the issuance of passports – for Ukrainian men of conscription age abroad.

The suspension was introduced yesterday after Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said services would be suspended until it introduces new procedures to comply with the new mobilization law, signed by President Volodymyr Zelensky on April 16, limiting consular services for Ukrainian men aged 18-60 abroad without military registration

Videos are circulating on social media of huge crowds of Ukrainian men – 300 according to some sources – gathering outside a passport service to voice their dissent. Some said they would stay as long as it takes to receive their passports.

The Ukrainian news channel, TRUHA, reported on Telegram, that local police arrived but took no action, while some of the protesters agreed with passport service workers that they would be able to submit paperwork but no documents would be issued to them.

The only exception is the issuance of documents for them to return home.

“How it looks now: a man of conscription age went abroad, showed his state that he does not care about its survival, and then comes and wants to receive services from this state,” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on the social network X (formerly known as Twitter) yesterday.

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“If anyone believes that while someone is fighting far away at the front line and risking his or her life for this state, someone else is staying abroad but receiving services from this state, then this is not how it works.”