Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation has warned that Russian Telegram channels are circulating AI-generated images and forged draft notices claiming that Ukrainian women are about to be forcibly mobilised, calling the material an informational provocation designed to sow panic and undermine voluntary recruitment. The centre stressed that women are not subject to compulsory mobilisation in Ukraine, that no such measure is planned, and that women join the Defense Forces only voluntarily, on contract.
The latest wave centres on a fabricated image showing a woman holding both an assault rifle and a baby, captioned "a real Ukrainian woman does these things in 40 seconds." Russian accounts presented it as a genuine Armed Forces recruitment advertisement photographed in a Kyiv shopping mall. Ukrainian fact-checkers who examined the picture found clear signs of AI generation, with the Hive Moderation tool estimating a 99% likelihood that it was artificially produced. No such poster was displayed in Kyiv or anywhere else.
A manufactured mobilisation scare
The woman-and-baby image did not travel alone. Russian television presenter Olesya Loseva was among those who amplified it on Telegram, mocking the supposed advertisement, while other channels circulated additional invented recruitment posters showing women in uniform under the slogan "now it's your turn, show your superpower." Separate posts claimed that women in Kyiv and Kharkiv had already received draft notices — claims Kyiv says are entirely fabricated.
According to the Center for Countering Disinformation, the operation follows a familiar script. "The enemy's goal is to artificially create a sense of the 'inevitability of forced mobilisation of women,' sow anxiety and discredit voluntary recruitment into the Defense Forces," the agency said, identifying a network of Russian Telegram channels as the primary source systematically producing and spreading AI fakes to destabilise the situation inside Ukraine. The centre has issued repeated warnings on the same theme, including on September 15, when it confirmed that similar supposed mobilisation posters were AI-generated and had never appeared in Lutsk or any other Ukrainian city.
What the law actually says
Ukrainian officials have been categorical about the legal position. There are no bills, decisions or internal discussions in Ukraine's parliament concerning the mobilisation of women, and the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence has confirmed that no legislative initiative exists. Women with medical or pharmaceutical education must register for military service, as fact-checkers at Myth Detector have noted, but registration does not mean compulsory mobilisation, and front-line service for women remains a voluntary choice.
That distinction is precisely what the fakes are designed to blur. Women serve throughout Ukraine's armed forces — in combat, medical, drone and air-defence roles — and Kyiv's recruitment messaging openly encourages voluntary enlistment. By presenting voluntary service as coercion, Moscow seeks to frighten families, discourage genuine volunteers and give Russian domestic audiences a story of Ukrainian desperation. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gave the narrative official backing at a September 15 embassy roundtable in Moscow, claiming he had "no doubt" Ukraine would resort to forcibly mobilising women because of manpower shortages — an assertion for which he offered no evidence.
Part of a wider information offensive
The mobilisation fakes are one strand of a broader Russian disinformation effort that Ukrainian and European monitors have tracked for months. The same networks have previously circulated forged screenshots impersonating the BBC, The Guardian, The Independent and Al Jazeera, invented an EU demand that Kyiv conscript women — falsely attributing supporting remarks to EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas — and flooded TikTok with AI-generated "soldier" and "witness" videos delivering scripted claims about the front.
For Ukraine, the stakes are practical as well as reputational. Mobilisation is a sensitive subject in a country in the fifth year of full-scale war, and recruitment depends on public trust that the rules are clear and honestly applied. A convincing fake that persuades even a fraction of families that daughters and mothers are about to be seized does real damage before any debunk appears. That is why the Center for Countering Disinformation names the technique as plainly as the falsehood: these are AI products from a coordinated network, not leaked Ukrainian policy. Women in Ukraine who serve do so because they chose to — and no Telegram forgery changes that.
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