Raising ‘real’ Russians: how many children Russia has abducted from Ukraine
31 May 2024 19:14
During the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Russian military took at least 19,546 children from their homeland to Russia. However, according to human rights activists, no one knows the exact number.
On the eve of the International Children’s Day [Kommersant] has collected the available information about young Ukrainians who were illegally and forcibly taken to Russia.
How many children have been forcibly removed from Ukraine by the occupiers
Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets has already made a statement that as of 2024, 42 children were killed and 1290 were injured. 2066 children went missing. 19,546 children have been deported or displaced by the Russian Federation.
However, human rights defenders and activists working on the issue of children forcibly transferred to Russia are confident that the real numbers are much higher. After all, official Kyiv has included in the list of abductees only those children and teenagers whose names and surnames have been identified.
In turn, Daria Gerasymchuk, Advisor to the Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights and Child Rehabilitation, said back in June 2023 that Russia could deport 200,000-300,000 children from Ukraine.
How Ukrainian children end up in Russia
The most common scheme for abducting children used by the Russian military is “removal to safety”, “free medical examination” and “rehabilitation in camps”. However, children never return home from these trips.
However, the occupiers are not limited to these three methods. According to Daria Gerasymchuk, the Ukrainian Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights, Russia uses six scenarios to abduct Ukrainian children. Among them:
- killing parents and then taking their children to the territory of the Russian Federation;
- direct removal of children from their families;
- separation of children from their parents during the so-called “filtration”;
- creating unsuitable conditions for children and adolescents in the occupied territories.
In addition, Russia is adopting legislative decisions that simplify the adoption of deported Ukrainian children and granting them the citizenship of the aggressor country.
For example, on 4 January 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed Decree No. 11 “On the definition of certain categories of foreign citizens and stateless persons who have the right to apply for citizenship of the Russian Federation”. The document states that children of Ukrainian citizens may receive a Russian passport upon Putin’s personal decision. For this purpose, there is no need to take into account the requirements of federal legislation.
An application for such citizenship can be submitted by the heads of Russian organisations in which the child is placed under their supervision.
“We understand the terrible consequences of such actions, because the next step after they receive Russian ‘citizenship’ will be the adoption of children as Russians, and then the change of their personal data. At some point, it may happen that not a single Ukrainian child will remain in the Russian Federation, because all of them may become Russians within the next 3 months,” commented Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, on the decision of the Russian leader.
What happens to Ukrainian children in Russia
Daria Gerasymchuk, the Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights and Child Rehabilitation, explained that Russia has its own methodology for children taken from Ukraine.
“It was a methodology, it spelled out everything, the deadlines, that you have to talk to the child alone, that you have to separate them every 2 months so that they don’t have a sense of unity, so that they don’t unite. Everyone had the same time limit – exactly 4 weeks later, conversations began about how your parents had abandoned you and you would not return home,” the official said.
She added that the occupiers also offer parents to send their children for so-called rehabilitation or recreation. After that, the children are not returned home.
In Ukraine, the story of how a member of the State Duma of the Russian Federation “adopted” (and actually kidnapped) a Ukrainian girl, Margarita Prokopenko, became illustrative. She lived in Kherson, which was occupied by the Russian Armed Forces at the time. The girl’s name and surname had even been changed so that any trace of the child was completely lost.
How many little Ukrainians have been returned home
Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has managed to return only 400 children from Russia. This data was made public during the exhibition and presentation of the book Living the War: Children” was announced by Daria Gerasymchuk, the Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights and Child Rehabilitation. Difficulties arise from the fact that none of the international mechanisms developed earlier have yielded results in the context of the Russian-Ukrainian war.
Human rights activists and civil servants involved in the return process believe that the unconditional return of Ukrainian children from Russian families will be possible only after the end of the war between Ukraine and Russia. They also point out that removing a child from a Russian family and placing him or her in a Ukrainian orphanage can cause trauma to the child. Experts suggest developing a return system in which Russian families would be obliged to provide Ukrainian education and upbringing for these children, but they would remain in these families.
The legal representative of the children should be Ukrainian state bodies that will take care of the welfare and interests of the children. They should take into account the wishes of the children and do everything possible to ensure their return to their home country, if they so wish. Obtaining an adequate education and taking care of national identity should also be important factors in the process of returning Ukrainian children from Russian families.
