JAKARTA - Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Thursday to increase the number of Russia's armed forces from 1.9 million to 2.04 million personnel.
The increase includes an increase of 137,000 combat personnel to 1.15 million personnel. It came into effect on January 1, according to the decree published on the government's legislative portal.
President Putin's decree did not say how the increase in staffing would be achieved, but instructed the government to set a suitable budget.
The last time President Putin set the number of Russian troops was in November 2017, when the number of combat personnel was set at 1.01 million of the total armed forces, including non-combatants, at 1.9 million.
Russia has not said how many casualties it has suffered in Ukraine since the first weeks of the campaign, when it said 1,351 of its soldiers had died.
Meanwhile, Western estimates say the actual number could be at least 10 times. Ukraine says it has killed or injured at least 45,000 Russian troops since the February 24 invasion.
It is known, according to the official annual report by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, Russia had 900,000 active service personnel at the beginning of this year, and a reserve of 2 million people with service in the last five years.
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