Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree expanding the country’s armed services amid his ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
The total number of armed forces will increase to 2.2 million people, of which 1.3 million will be servicemen, according to a decree published on the Kremlin’s website late Friday.
That will increase the number of servicemen by 170,000 people, the Defense Ministry said in a statement on Telegram.
The ministry also said that the move was due to the ongoing war in Ukraine and the “expansion” of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, but it doesn’t plan a mobilization.
Putin ordered an increase in the size of the armed forces to 2.04 million people in August 2022, just less than a month before Russia declared a “partial mobilization.” That was the country’s first since the Nazi invasion in World War II, according to historians.
Last year, Putin approved a plan to increase the number of servicemen to 1.5 million people, a process the Kremlin expects to last through 2026.