Russian President Vladimir Putin has compared Ukraine’s mobilization efforts to rounding up stray dogs, claiming that Ukrainian men are being forcibly sent to the front lines.

Axar.az reports, citing Russian media, that Putin made the remarks on October 22.

“They kept saying that they were ready to fight to the last Ukrainian. But how does the Ukrainian leadership itself treat its own citizens? Does it also treat them as expendable material, like those who want to fight against us from abroad? After all, these are their own citizens who are fighting. Yet we see them being rounded up in the streets like stray dogs and forcibly sent to the front,” Putin said.