Russia, in its desparation for manpower, is forcing women convicts in occupied regions of Ukraine into joining the army, the Ukrainian military has said.

The intelligence tip-off confirms reports in January that the Russian army was making thousands of Ukrainian convicts in areas it occupies to sign up to fight.

“Throughout the week, the occupiers recruited about 50 people from the women’s correctional colony in the city of Snizhne in the temporarily occupied territory of Donetsk region,” said the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

It comes after the UK Ministry of Defence suggested that Russia was running out of soldiers to use in so-called “human wave attacks” as recruitment from Russian prisons slows.

Women do not usually fight in front line combat roles in the Russian army.

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