In Three Regions Of The Russian Federation, One In Three Men Who Died Had Perished In The War
- 9.11.2026, 22:02
Russia has begun to draft more and more older men into the front lines.
In Buryatia, Tuva, and the Trans-Baikal Region, about one-third of men aged 18 to 49 who died between the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and mid-2024 died from causes related to the war. This is evidenced by leaked data from Rosstat, which was analyzed by Bloomberg). By comparison, in Moscow and St. Petersburg, the proportion of such men was 10%. By October 30, 2026, Mediazona and the BBC Russian Service had identified the names of 5,879 casualties from Buryatia, 2,421 from Tuva, and 5,736 from Transbaikal, while in Moscow and St. Petersburg, the figures were 3,505 and 2,362, respectively.
The Rosstat data, stolen by the Belarusian hacker group “Cyberpartisans” and the Ukrainian group Silent Crow, contains more than 11 million death certificates covering the period from 2021 through the end of August 2026. The records specify the age, place of residence, and circumstances of death. According to the agency’s estimates, nearly 392,700 deaths are directly linked to the war. This is confirmed by special codes, as well as the terms “military operation,” “shelling,” and “drones,” which the agency uses to indicate the causes.
The data also shows that as the fighting dragged on, Russia began to draft more and more older men to the front lines. While 146 men aged 50–59 died from war-related causes in the first half of 2022, during the same period in 2025, that number rose to more than 12,600—or 16% of all male deaths in that age group. Among men aged 18 to 29, the war accounted for approximately two-thirds of all deaths during the same period.
Journalists found no signs of falsification: the leak’s metadata matches an actual export from the database. A comparison with official Rosstat statistics revealed a discrepancy of 0.1% for 2021, 0.2% for 2022, and about 1% for 2023. In the latter case, the higher percentage may be due to delays in registering war-related deaths, Bloomberg notes.