Zelenskyy boosts army wages and seeks foreign recruits to counter manpower shortage

Ukraine will raise military wages and expand efforts to recruit fighters abroad, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced, as the army faces a manpower shortage after four years of conflict with Russia. In May, Zelenskyy’s government said it would explore measures to boost troop numbers after talks on ending the war stalled. “We agreed on how to increase the financial resilience of our defense and further transformation of the Ukrainian army,” Zelenskyy said on Friday after meeting key ministers. “The cabinet of ministers will approve a specific mechanism, and the government should start the first new payments as early as June,” he added.

Ukraine has secured a €90 billion ($104 billion) loan from the EU, allowing defense spending to reach a record 4.4 trillion hryvnias ($97 billion) this year. The funds are expected to start flowing this month. Zelenskyy said the basic military wage would rise by one-third to 30,000 hryvnias ($700) per month, matching the country’s average monthly salary, which has steadily increased due to labor shortages during the war, according to military analysts and economists. Infantry soldiers on the front line will receive an average monthly salary of 300,000 hryvnias (about $7,000), up from the current 100,000–150,000 hryvnias. They will also be offered fixed-term contracts of 10, 14, or 24 months for combat duties.

Kyiv also aims to recruit more foreign volunteers. “I have instructed to create significantly more opportunities to recruit foreign volunteers into the Ukrainian army, and there will be more recruitment channels in this regard,” Zelenskyy said. Since the war began, about 10,000 foreign volunteers from over 70 countries have joined the Ukrainian armed forces, according to Ukrainian military publications.

EU ambassadors from the 27 member states agreed on Friday to advance membership talks with Ukraine and Moldova, with the first phase of negotiations set to begin on Monday. Zelenskyy has made EU membership a key strategic goal. Writing on Telegram, he thanked the EU and its leaders “for this strong step for Europe” and added: “Ukraine is carrying out what is necessary and it is important that the EU is also keeping its word.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Ukraine’s increasing drone strikes on Russia aim to “sow confusion” and damage the economy. Ukraine has recently struck deeper into Russian territory, regularly hitting oil refineries and export hubs. “Their goal is to create a split in Russian society, sow confusion and inflict economic damage,” Putin told soldiers at a Kremlin meeting on Friday. “But they will not succeed.” The remarks came hours after Kyiv said it had hit a major oil refinery more than 1,000 km (about 620 miles) from the front line. Putin acknowledged that Ukrainian strikes had caused “economic damage” but claimed that “everything is quickly restored.” The governor of Russia’s Bryansk region reported one killed and one injured in a drone strike on Friday, while the Defense Ministry said air defense units had downed 185 Ukrainian drones over a 12-hour period. The regional headquarters, cited by Russian news agencies, said 62 drones were destroyed, without specifying a timeframe. Russia’s Defense Ministry reported 185 drones intercepted between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Moscow time across about a dozen regions, mostly in central Russia.

On Friday, Britain announced a full ban on Russian-made diesel and jet fuel by 2027, setting a timeline for ending a temporary license for Russian oil products. Last month, Britain said it would continue allowing imports of diesel and jet fuel refined from Russian crude in third countries, deferring a previously announced ban due to supply issues caused by the Iran war. The government said existing sanctions were not being lifted but new sanctions were being phased in. On Friday, the Business and Trade Ministry said the temporary license for phasing in the ban would expire by January 1.