Wladimir PutinSecurity forces of Russia arrested over 1,300 civilians in Russia on Wednesday after protests erupted in the country denouncing the president’s decision to partially mobilize, according to an independent Russian human rights group.

What happened: Thousands of people in Russia took to the streets to protest against the Kremlin hours after Putin ordered the country’s first military service since the Second World War, the conscription of reservists into the Wehrmacht, according to the protest observer group OVD-Info.

See also: Putin escalates war in Ukraine as he taps into military reserves: Says ‘no bluff’ that Russia’s capabilities are ‘more modern’ than NATO’s

Information gathered by the group from 38 Russian cities showed that more than 1,311 people had been arrested by late evening, including at least 502 from Moscow and 524 from St. Petersburg, Russia’s second most populous city.

In a statement to Russian news agencies, an Interior Ministry official Irina Volk said officials had called off attempts to stage so-called small-scale protests, Reuters reported.

“In some regions there were attempts to stage illegal actions that brought together an extremely small number of participants,” said Volk. “These were all stopped. And those who broke the law were arrested and taken to police stations for investigation and accountability.”

Meanwhile, the national security agency of Finland, the country that shares a 1,340-kilometer border with Russia, said traffic out of Putin’s country was “increased” last night. “The number has definitely increased,” said the head of international affairs at the Finnish Border Guard. Matti Pitkanittysaid Reuters.

Continue reading: Putin and Zelenskyy exchange more than 300 prisoners of war in the largest exchange of its kind since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine