SET among mountains and woods, a dog playing on its pebbled shore, the river marking Ukraine's border with Romania looks tranquil. But 39 men have drowned here fleeing the draft.
Facing a desperate shortage of men to fight on the eastern front where the Ukrainian army is being driven back by advancing Russians, Kyiv in May passed a law on mobilisation to replenish its ranks.
Most Ukrainian men of fighting age are barred from leaving the country, and to avoid mobilisation several thousand have risked their lives by trying to swim across the Tysa River in the country's west, to reach Romania.
"Every 24 hours, we see one of them trying to cross," says border guard Oleg Seleznyov, stroking one of the dogs used by his canine service brigade to patrol the river at the border village of Velyky Bychkiv.
This 32-year-old knows the river like the back of his hand and is well aware of how formidable its rapids are, especially at night.
"We've rescued lots of people who thought it would be easy to get across," he says.
The Tysa is a major river that flows from Ukraine through Hungary to Serbia.
The most popular place for draft dodgers to attempt to swim across is a 60-kilometre (37-mile) stretch where the river flows close to a road and villages including Veliky Bychkiv, a route also used by smugglers of contraband.
To spot people attempting to cross the river in the wild, mountainous region of Transcarpathia, border guards have watchtowers and sentries permanently posted on banks and can deploy surveillance drones with thermal cameras at night.
They also set up roadblocks at frequently changing locations in the region to check men's military papers, mobilise those whose papers are incorrect and spot draft dodgers.
Not many have made it across the Tysa, Ukrainian border guards insist, saying at least 39 have lost their lives in the attempt.
Yet police at the Romanian frontier have said they have recorded almost 15,000 illegal crossings since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Seleznyov and his team acknowledge they are up against people smugglers who know the terrain as well as they do.
Those aiding draft dodgers for money are "often former smugglers", says Seleznyov, who has worked in the region since he was 18.
"They use the same routes, the same methods."
In the Transcarpathian region, dense forests create a porous border between Ukraine and EU member states Romania and Hungary and smuggling of alcohol and cigarettes out of Ukraine is rife.
While the Tysa's banks are no-man's land, defended by hundreds of kilometres of barbed wire, people smugglers get to know border guard positions through local contacts and bribery.
"We also use locals: we have our informants," says Seleznyov.
"They're watching us, we're watching them... and you end up suspecting everyone."
Velyky Bychkiv's streets are lined with kitschy opulent villas. The main road through the town runs along the border and it is not unusual to see cars with Romanian or Hungarian number plates.
"According to rumours, there are stashes of smuggled cigarettes in every garage," said one of the guards.
But smuggling out Ukrainian draft dodgers is "more profitable and less risky than running contraband," she said.
The average price for taking a draft dodger across is $15,000, according to Selezynov.
Around 50 kilometres away, 58-year-old Vasyl sits on a public bench near the rail station of the town of Rakhiv.
Wearing a cloth hat, with grey stubble on his tanned cheeks, he is waiting for his next customer.
"I take the guys to the bridge in my car, they cross. I wave them goodbye and after that we aren't acquainted any more," says the former cigarette smuggler.
Questioned by AFP in a quieter location, he boasts of having "four or five customers per day". A few metres away, his two henchmen keep watch from a black car with tinted windows.
"It's best to go on a Sunday," he says. "In Romania, the guards will all be drunk already."
He brags of knowing every nook and corner of the region -- and also its local police, whose 4x4 is parked a few metres away.
"I bribe them once a month and that's all. They have their job, I have mine," he says with a wry smile.
A life jacket is not included in the price of passage.
Seleznyov shows a picture on his phone of one man they arrested trying to swim across -- heavily built and wearing inflatable armbands in the shape of pink flamingos.
"They aren't there to help you," Seleznyov says of the people smugglers, his eyes still on the river.
"Once they have got their money, they send the guys off to the slaughter."
"To be honest, it's better to die at the front than at the bottom of the Tysa."
* The writer is from AFP