Council of Republic approves draft law on people's militia

Senators at the tenth session of the Council of the Republic of the seventh convocation approved the draft law "On the people's militia," said BelTA.

The document aims to establish a legal framework for citizens of Belarus, foreign nationals and stateless persons, permanently residing in the country, to voluntarily exercise their right to participate in martial law in the territory of Belarus.

The bill was presented to the senators by the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces - First Deputy Defense Minister, Viktor Gulevich.

The draft law defines the terms "people's militia", "people's militia unit" and "volunteer of the people's militia", as well as general issues of financial and material support of the people's militia, restrictions when enlisting citizens, the order of leadership of the people's militia, formation, manning and deployment of its units, the performance of their tasks.

"The current experience of creating volunteer formations of territorial communities of Ukraine in 2022 was taken as a basis. The units in question were created from among citizens, mostly volunteers, usually not subject to conscription by mobilization, to solve high-priority tasks in places not involving troops, under the direction of the internal affairs or local government. This approach is also laid down in the bill," said Viktor Gulevich.