“The Way Home” Russian women war protest movement

“The Way Home” movement (Russian: «Пути домой») is a protest movement of the wives of Russian soldiers mobilized in Ukraine.  In the beginning the group wanted rotation, but now they want an end to the Ukraine war and the return of their husbands. (1)

The group started in September 2023 after Andrei Kartapolov, the chair of parliament’s defense committee, announced there would be no rotation for troops in Ukraine. (4) Maria Andreeva and other wives met on social media and started a tradition of wearing white scarves and laying flowers at the eternal flame in front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier near the Kremlin. Andreeva’s husband and cousin were drafted and sent to Ukraine. (3) Their Telegram channel Put Domoy (The Way Home), has more than 35,000 members. (4)

February 2024 protest

The weekly Saturday protests by families of mobilized soldiers started Feb. 3 at Okhotny Ryad subway station in Central Moscow.  It was announced by mobilized wives, opposition leader Navalny‘s FBK, and politician Maxim Katz.  It was reported in the Russian telegram channel SOTA. (2)  Several international journalists were detained at the demonstration and later released. (5)

It is being said on Twitter that the Russian authorities never refer to the name of the movement.  Wouldn’t it be a shame if it was to find its way into Wikipedia, what with the NYT, BBC, and Guardian all covering the story….

Russia: Regime enforcers conducting mass arrests at the "Way Back Home" movement organized by soldiers' wives. Journalists are also being arrested. The Kremlin is afraid – in talking about the detentions, they never said the name of the movement. https://t.co/kIDEOa4Rqz pic.twitter.com/MgpmzEnpQw

— Igor Sushko (@igorsushko) February 3, 2024

Sources

(1) https://news.yahoo.com/wives-russian-soldiers-stage-another-160000696.html
(2) https://t.me/s/sotaproject/73434
(3) https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68056939
(4) https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/25/russia-military-wives-mothers-protest-against-putin-war-ukraine-troops-female
(5) https://cpj.org/2024/02/moscow-police-detain-around-20-journalists-during-protest-by-soldiers-wives/

See also

• Telegram channel “The Way Home” (68, 513 subscribers) https://t.me/PYTY_DOMOY archived https://web.archive.org/web/20231130060143/https://t.me/PYTY_DOMOY (Something weird is going on with this Telegram channel – the Russian authorities have obviously tried to take it down, this is probably a whole story in itself.)
• Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers of Russia (CSM),  an anti-war movement during the first Chechen war in 1994 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_of_the_Committees_of_Soldiers%27_Mothers_of_Russia
• (paywall) https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/27/world/europe/russia-ukraine-protests-women.html https://web.archive.org/web/20231201084432/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/27/world/europe/russia-ukraine-protests-women.html