There are no vouchers issued as “payment for service in the Armed Forces of Ukraine”. Russian propagandists took a military bond Ukraine issued in 2014 and created fake, claiming that this document is issued to Ukrainian military in lieu of salary payments.
A number of so-called Z Telegram channels (channels supporting Russia’s war against Ukraine) are disseminating fakes claiming that Ukrainian military personnel are not being paid in currency, but in vouchers that can be cashed out only in 2026.
“Now Ukrainian servicemen are also fighting on credit,” writes Kherson-news.ru.
A Google search a similar image turns up a very similar certificate, and a comparison of these documents immediately indicates that the “voucher” being distributed is fake. Both certificates have the same signature, although the names of the ministers are different. The 2014 certificate features the signature of Oleksandr Shlapak, he was Finance Minister from February 27, 2014 to December 2, 2014. The certificate being disseminated by Russian propagandists and their Telegram channels, features the name Serhiy Marchenko, the current Ukrainian Finance Minister.
An online search for the signatures of both ministers showed that the “voucher” was a fake. Purporting to be a document issued in 2023, it still features Shlapak’s signature from 2014. The fake’s creators were too lazy and unimaginative to actually photoshop the signature of the current Finance Minister onto their fake document.
Russian fakers took the form of a military bond issued in Ukraine in 2014, and with the help of a photo editor turned it into a “certificate that is issued as payment for service in the Ukrainian Armed Forces”.
As of February 1, 2023, a new procedure for calculating additional payments to military personnel was introduced. Accordingly, additional monetary remuneration for servicemen who participate in hostilities directly does not change, while for others, the amount of payment will be differentiated depending on the place, conditions and service characteristics. At the same time, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry announced that the basic monthly military personnel salary will be increased, so that the minimum wage for the Ukrainian Armed Forces, the National Guard and the State Border Service is not less than UAH 20,100.
Earlier, StopFake debunked a Russian fake claiming that EU countries would allegedly extradite Ukrainian men to be mobilized.
