Macer Hall, Telegraph

The [British] Army is sending a team of soldiers to Russia to advise officers in the former Soviet armed forces how to combat the growing number of suicides among military personnel.

Russian officers requested help from their British counterparts after estimates that thousands of conscripts were taking their lives every year because of low morale, poor conditions and brutality meted out by superiors.

The move follows growing informal contacts between the two forces since the collapse of the Soviet Union 10 years ago.

Major Philip Schofield, currently based at Upavon, Wilts, will lead a small team on a visit to Russia later this year.

Major Schofield was unavailable for comment last week but in an interview in this month's edition of Soldier, the Army's official magazine, he said: "In the Soviet Union, military service was considered a prestigious occupation. There was no problem filling the ranks with conscripts."

Morale fell drastically after the collapse of communism, however, with economic crises leading to cuts in the once proud defence forces.

Russian authorities have been unwilling to acknowledge the extent of the problem, although the Military Prosecutor's Office has admitted dealing with 2,000 conscript deaths every year, the majority of which are suicides. Unofficial estimates by human rights organisations have put the annual toll at nearer 3,000.

The culture of dedovshchina, or bullying, has been blamed for the high suicide rate, with cases of torture and rape frequently reported.

Source : Post-Soviet Armies Newsletter

Russian Army's Suicide Toll 22.7% of All Casualties

20 April, 1999

Itar-Tass
St Petersburg, correspondent Nikolay Krupenik

Thirty cases of suicide per 100,000 Russian army servicemen were registered in 1998, accounting for 22.7 per cent of the total number of servicemen who lost their lives during this period, Lt-Gen Ivan Chizh, head of the Defence Ministry's main military medical directorate told a training conference of the leading personnel of the Russian armed forces' medical service, held in St Petersburg today.

Nevertheless, he stated that "the indicator of the health of servicemen remains stable". He pointed out that the high incidence of suicide in the army was due to higher stress levels in society and the resulting psychological problems among servicemen. Thus following each conscription 500 people are released from the army in the first three months of service due to psychological problems becoming exacerbated and this figure trebles, as a rule, during the following 12 to 18 months.

The participants in the training conferences of military medical personnel will devote an expanded plenary session of the learned medical council to the problems of psychological health and psychological and physiological backup for servicemen in their profesisonal duties.

Source : Post-Soviet Armies Newsletter