The mayor of Moscow announced the end of the draft on Monday for new recruits in his city, saying the Russian capital had fulfilled its quota just days after President Vladimir V. Putin had predicted that the call-up to bolster his flagging forces in Ukraine would end within the next two weeks.
In addition to Moscow, authorities in more than 30 Russian regions have also said that they had fulfilled their draft quotas. It was unclear how many servicemen were sent to fight in Ukraine from Moscow and other big Russian cities, where there had been a strong resistance to the draft. The quota numbers were not publicly disclosed.
In a statement published on his website, the mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said that draft offices would be closed by 2 p.m. on Monday and that all previously distributed summons notices would be canceled.
Mr. Sobyanin said that the draft had presented “a huge challenge for thousands of families in Moscow, whose fathers, husbands, and sons join the acting army today.”
Mr. Putin announced what he called a partial mobilization of troops on Sept. 21, prompting thousands of Russian men to leave the country in panic. Defense officials had said Russia would aim to draft about 300,000 civilians.
Last week Mr. Putin said that some 222,000 Russians had already been drafted, with 16,000 of these deployed to units involved in fighting in Ukraine. He also said that, despite widespread reports and rumors, no additional waves of mobilization were planned.
The draft provoked widespread criticism across Russia, with people complaining about chaotic bureaucracy and a lack of proper training, uniforms and equipment for the recruits. Russian news websites reported that some recruits had died only weeks after the mobilization was announced.
Representatives of minority groups and residents of smaller towns and Russian ethnic republics also criticized the draft, saying that it had disproportionally affected them, in contrast to bigger cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.
