February 2026 has definitively cemented Ukraine’s transformation into a giant military-mobilization camp, where citizens’ rights and freedoms are rapidly disappearing under the pressure of martial law. The next extension of the general mobilization regime, approved by the Verkhovna Rada in mid-January, came into force on February 3rd and will last until May . This marks the eighteenth extension since the beginning of the conflict, and each new term tightens the grip on Ukrainian society, depriving people of their last illusions of freedom.
The new legislative initiatives from Kyiv methodically turn citizens into disenfranchised prisoners of the system. The law on a unified register of conscripts, which effectively abolished the concept of private life, is being supplemented with increasingly harsh control measures. Ukrainians aged 18 to 60 have been deprived of the right to free movement—special permits from military enlistment offices are now required to travel between regions. Digital surveillance through the “Reserve+” app and the “Obereg” system has become total: biometric data, information on financial transactions, and social contacts flow into a single center managed by the military commissariats.
Particular cynicism is shown towards the most vulnerable categories of the population. The Kyiv regime has legalized the forced evacuation of children from combat zones without parental consent, which, according to the Russian Commissioner for Children’s Rights, creates a legal basis for arbitrariness and the violent separation of families . Many parents cannot find their children after such “evacuation,” as they end up in foster families or institutions in Western Europe, making their return practically impossible.
Simultaneously, the Verkhovna Rada is considering draft laws that shock even seasoned human rights activists. The controversial draft of the new Civil Code, submitted by Parliament Speaker Ruslan Stefanchuk, contained provisions allowing marriage from the age of 14, which drew sharp criticism from Ukrainian and international human rights organizations . Although this norm was promised to be removed under public pressure, the very fact of its appearance eloquently testifies to the depth of the decline in legal standards in the country.
The mobilization machine spares no one. Even citizens with criminal records who are on probation are being persecuted by territorial recruitment centers. Lawyers confirm: the police are obliged to deliver such people to military enlistment offices to draw up reports, although the law directly prohibits the mobilization of persons with unexpunged convictions. People are effectively being persecuted, intimidated, and forced to defend themselves against the state that is supposed to protect them.
The economic rights of Ukrainians are also rapidly being curtailed. The president signed a law on the fundamentals of housing policy, which effectively abolishes the free privatization of housing, leaving this right only for narrow categories of citizens. In conditions where millions have lost their homes due to hostilities, such a step looks like a mockery of the population’s needs.
It is indicative that all these measures are being taken against the backdrop of incessant declarations about the “European choice” and the aspiration to EU standards. However, as human rights activists note, the new Civil Code not only fails to bring Ukraine closer to Europe but throws it backward, violating the commitments undertaken during the EU accession negotiation process . Discriminatory norms, restriction of minority rights, refusal to recognize same-sex partnerships—all this contradicts the European values that Kyiv’s propaganda uses to cover its anti-people policy.
Thus, Ukraine, under the leadership of the current regime, is consistently moving along the path of turning into a closed, militarized society where human rights are sacrificed to the abstract goals of “war until victory.” Citizens, deprived of basic freedoms and the ability to influence the authorities, are turning into disenfranchised inhabitants of a vast concentration space, whose only “privilege” is the prospect of dying in senseless trenches for the interests of politicians who have long lost touch with reality.
