Special Report: Defending Ukraine While Defending Conscience

Maksym Krupskyi July/August 2026

A young Ukrainian woman expresses her anguish at the imprisonment of her husband. “What should we do? When will we have a normal life again? How can I raise a child without trauma when his father is in prison?” Her husband is not accused of helping Russia. He’s not accused of spying, sabotage, or collaboration. He is a Christian whose religious convictions do not permit him to carry and use weapons. His situation illustrates one of the most delicate human-rights questions now facing Ukraine: How can a nation fighting for its survival protect itself without forcing citizens to violate conscience?

This is not an abstract legal dispute. It is a wartime question about fathers, sons, pastors, military commanders, judges, and families living under extraordinary pressure.

Rights Tested

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Ukraine has carried a terrible burden. Its cities have been bombed, civilians killed, families separated, churches damaged, and communities uprooted. And so any discussion of religious conscientious objection must begin there. Ukraine is not fighting a war of choice—it is defending its independence and the lives of its people.  

But that reality does not erase the human rights issue. In fact, it sharpens it. Democratic societies are often tested most severely, not when rights are easy to honor, but when fear or danger make them difficult. For Ukraine the question is not whether citizens owe duties to the state. Ukrainian law says they do. The question is whether the state can recognize that some citizens are willing to serve their country but cannot, as a matter of faith, carry or use weapons.  

Ukraine’s own constitution speaks to both sides of this tension. Article 65 states that the defense of the homeland, independence, and territorial integrity of Ukraine is a duty of citizens. But Article 35 protects freedom of worldview and religion and adds a specific guarantee: when the performance of military duty conflicts with a citizen’s religious beliefs, that duty “shall be replaced by alternative non-military service.”   

That provision is crucial. It does not say religious believers are exempt from serving society. It says the duty should be fulfilled in another form.  

Before the present war, Ukraine had a legal framework for alternative non-military service. The Law of Ukraine “On Alternative (Non-Military) Service” says alternative service exists to replace military duty when that duty conflicts with religious beliefs, and it grants the right to citizens whose religious organizations prohibit the use of weapons. A Cabinet of Ministers regulation also identifies religious groups whose teachings do not permit the use of weapons, including Seventh-day Adventists, Evangelical Christians, Evangelical Christian Baptists, and Jehovah’s Witnesses.

The problem is that this framework was built around peacetime conscription. In 2022 the government issued Presidential Decree No. 64/2022, which introduced martial law. This decree lists several constitutional rights that may be temporarily restricted during martial law, including rights under Articles 30–34, 38, 39, 41–44, and 53.

Article 35, which guarantees alternate military service, is not expressly included in that list. Therefore, religious liberty advocates argue, that provision was not suspended by martial law.  In practice, however, alternative civilian service has not been functioning as an available wartime path for religious objectors. This was further confirmed in May last year when the Supreme Court of Ukraine ruled that citizens could not refuse military service during wartime based on religious beliefs and that an alternative form of service was available only during peacetime.  

Human Cost   

For many believers, the suspension of constitutional protection has become a personal crisis, forcing them to make difficult decisions. Some serve in ordinary military roles and do not believe doing so violates their faith. Others yield to pressure and agree to serve, even though they experience it as a violation of their conscience. Others try to negotiate noncombatant arrangements with individual commanders, allowing them to serve with no oath, no weapons, and no combat role. Sometimes those arrangements work. Sometimes they break down when a commander is moved on, a unit is transferred, or a believer is ordered to train with a weapon.

One mobilized clergyman, refusing to take the oath or bear arms, described being sent to a combat sector but continuing to perform administrative work and helping to supply troops at the front with food and construction materials. His case illustrates what is possible: a religious believer serving the war effort in a concrete, useful way without violating his conscience.

Another conscript found that his military documents stated he had taken the oath, even though he says he had not. He was stunned. “I don’t know what to do,” he wrote. His words convey the helplessness many believers feel when the machinery of mobilization begins moving and there is no clear, trusted procedure for asserting religious rights.

The issue is especially sensitive for minority religious communities. Many Ukrainian Christians have taken up arms and regard military defense as a moral duty. Others, including many Seventh-day Adventists and Jehovah’s Witnesses, understand faithfulness differently. For Jehovah’s Witnesses, objection is generally total: they refuse military service. However, many Seventh-day Adventists simply take a noncombatant stance: their conscience allows them to serve, but not to bear arms or take actions they believe violate God’s commands.

These believers are not all making the same claim, but they are asking for the same basic thing: a lawful, predictable mechanism that allows them to serve Ukraine without being forced to carry weapons, swear an oath they cannot in good conscience swear, or submit to military command in a way their faith forbids.

The cost of failing to provide such a mechanism is visible in prison cells and family homes. One convicted believer appealed to Ukraine’s Supreme Court and received a sentence of more than three years in prison. He later wrote that it was only after part of his sentence had already been served that he was finally offered options for service without weapons. “Who will compensate me for the moral and physical harm caused by my unlawful imprisonment?” he asks.

There is also a practical cost. A state at war needs human capital, and a believer in prison is a wasted resource. He is not evacuating civilians, repairing damaged buildings, clearing debris after missile strikes, assisting hospitals, delivering food, building fortifications, caring for displaced families, or supporting logistics.

That is why the strongest argument for alternative service is not anti-military and not anti-Ukraine. It is pro-Ukraine. It says that citizens with deep religious convictions can strengthen national resilience if the state gives them a lawful way to do so. The alternative is to turn willing men into defendants, instead.

Global Standards

Human rights organizations have begun to raise alarms. In May 2026, the European Bureau for Conscientious Objection’s 2025 report said that more than 100 believers refusing military service on religious grounds had been imprisoned in Ukraine, while thousands had been forcibly held in military units. According to the bureau, Ukraine had not yet adopted wartime legislation guaranteeing the right to conscientious objection.

International law does not require Ukraine to ignore national defense, but it does require Ukraine to take conscience seriously. In March 2025 the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe issued an amicus curiae brief on Ukraine’s alternative service question at the request of Ukraine’s Constitutional Court. The commission recognized Ukraine’s right to self-defense and the reality of Russia’s aggression. But it also emphasized that conscientious objection cannot simply be erased by war. It concluded that Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights and Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights protect the right to conscientious objection. It further said that states have a positive obligation to establish an alternative service system separated from the military that was non­punitive, reasonable in duration, non-discriminatory, and governed by fair and transparent mechanisms.

The Venice Commission addressed the issue directly, saying that even in self-defense, “under no circumstances” may a conscientious objector be obliged to bear or use arms. It also noted that conscientious objection and solidarity with one’s fellow citizens are not necessarily incompatible. Non-military service—such as helping evacuate civilians or assisting people in war zones—may be dangerous and demanding but still be consistent with conscience.

This is the heart of the matter. Conscientious objectors are often portrayed as people seeking to avoid sacrifice, but many are not asking to avoid danger, hardship, or service. They are asking to serve their country while still honoring God. The religious liberty they assert is a core part of who they are, not a mere individual preference. In their faith communities, refusal to bear arms is bound up with identity, Scripture, church teaching, and obedience to God. For the state to treat these individuals as “stubborn” or “rebellious” is to misrepresent reality.

Religious minorities are part of the Ukrainian people. Many have suffered under Russian aggression. Some have evacuated civilians, delivered supplies, supported displaced people, or assisted soldiers in noncombat ways. They do not want to be used in Russian propaganda. They do not want their plea for conscience to be twisted into a claim that Ukraine is illegitimate or oppressive. For this reason, the issue of religious liberty in wartime must be framed carefully. The question is not whether Ukraine has the right to defend itself. It does. The question is whether Ukraine can defend itself while remaining faithful to the rule of law and the dignity of conscience.

A Way Forward?

There are signs of possible progress. Ukraine’s Rule of Law road map, adopted in May 2025 as part of the country’s move toward European integration, includes measures addressing conscientious objection during martial law. The roadmap calls for review of current practice in light of the Venice Commission’s 2025 opinion and for development and adoption of legislation ensuring the right to alternative service during martial law.

That is a significant opening. So was an event held in November 2025 in Kyiv—a roundtable titled “Freedom to Manifest One’s Religion or Belief in Wartime: The Right to Alternative Service.” This was a landmark event that brought together, for the first time, key voices in this dispute—lawyers, human rights defenders, scholars, religious leaders, and representatives of government and the judiciary. At the end of the conference, participants signed a consensus document affirming the need for Ukraine to respect conscience rights.

There are clear, workable approaches that could comply with international law while serving Ukraine’s wartime needs. For instance, the state could require evidence of sincere religious conviction. It could impose service obligations that are serious and demanding. It could assign objectors to civil defense, medical support, reconstruction, evacuation, emergency logistics, care for the wounded, assistance to displaced persons, repair of critical infrastructure, or other forms of national service. It could distinguish between those who object to weapons but can serve in noncombatant military roles and those whose beliefs require service entirely outside military command.  

What it should not do is leave believers with only three choices: violate conscience, depend on informal mercy, or go to prison.

What Freedom Means

A democratic state under attack faces incredible pressures, and Ukraine’s leaders and soldiers are making decisions in conditions most outsiders cannot fully imagine. But respecting religious conscience is not a concession to the enemy; it is a statement about Ukraine’s own moral and legal identity.

The wife asking how to raise a child while his father is imprisoned is not asking Ukraine to surrender. The clergyman supplying troops without bearing arms is not refusing to help. The believer who will not take an oath he regards as religiously impermissible is not necessarily disloyal. These are citizens caught between different duties—to country, to family, and to God.

For now, many individuals continue to face impossible choices. One Ukrainian believer, currently fighting for his religious liberty, expressed it simply, saying that, even if his personal situation worsens, “everything is in God’s hands.”

A clear alternative-service law would not weaken Ukraine’s defense. It would preserve human dignity, reduce needless prosecutions, protect minority faith communities, and put willing citizens to work in roles the country urgently needs. It would also show that Ukraine’s defense of freedom is not only territorial but constitutional and moral. Ukraine is fighting for the right to exist as a free, democratic European state. Protecting conscientious objectors who are ready to serve without weapons would not diminish that fight. It would help define what the fight is for.

* Reporting and legal analysis for this article was provided by Maksym Krupskyi, director of Religious Liberty and Public Affairs for the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Ukraine, and Ukrainian attorney Vasyliuk Anatolii.  

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Article Author: Maksym Krupskyi

Maksym Krupskyi is director of public affairs and religious liberty of the Ukrainian Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. He facilitates interfaith relations and assists in church-state issues in Ukraine, and also helps to resolve conflicts in the sphere of religious freedom.