A boy who disappeared during the occupation of Kherson region ended up in a Russian orphanage

Seven-year-old Ostap Topolin from Oleshky found himself in Russia after the outbreak of war, having lost his home and father. He was currently in a Russian orphanage and was placed on an adoption platform.

This was the subject of an investigation by Texty.org.ua.

The journalists' research showed that tens of thousands of Ukrainian children, including Ostap Topolin, a boy from Oleshky, ended up in Russia after the full-scale invasion. The Ukrainian Parliamentary Ombudsman estimates that more than 150,000 children were taken away, and the Children of War portal has documented nearly 19,500 cases. However, the photographs of less than a thousand children have been officially published, which has become an important tool for finding them.

Ostap was born and raised in Oleshky. When he was five years old, his mother died, and the boy was left in the care of his father , Vasyl Topolin, and his common-law wife. Until February 2022, Ostap studied at a local school and actively participated in the celebration of National Unity Day - his photo in an embroidered shirt became the first point of identification.

After the invasion, the town quickly came under the control of the Russian army. Ostap's father was detained several times, and after his last release, he and his son disappeared. According to investigators, the family was taken to the interior of Russia, approximately to Nizhny Tagil in the Sverdlovsk region, where the father and son received Russian citizenship on an expedited basis.

In June 2023, the family's house in Oleshky was completely destroyed by flooding after the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant was blown up. In the fall of 2023, Ostap's father was found dead in a forest near Nizhny Tagil. The cause of death was not officially reported.

After that, the boy was placed in a Russian orphanage, and in December 2023, his profile appeared on an adoption platform. The profile did not indicate that he was a citizen of Ukraine. Journalists identified Ostap from photographs, his teacher from a Ukrainian school confirmed his identity, and Russian publications that mentioned his deceased father finally confirmed the child's identity.

Ostap's life used to be ordinary: his father kept greenhouses, earned money by selling vegetables and flowers, spent time fishing with his son, and his stepmother helped him with his studies. His first year at school was the last time he could study in his native Ukrainian. After the war broke out, the family was forced to move, leaving their home, garden, friends, and school life behind.

According to journalists, in Nizhny Tagil, the boy was subjected to ideological re-education in an orphanage, where he was forced to participate in the celebration of the Defender of the Fatherland Day and other state events.

The last confirmed information about Ostap dates back to mid-2024. His adoption form has disappeared and his exact whereabouts are unknown. Experts noted that although Ukrainian authorities and private initiatives have managed to return more than a thousand children from the occupied territories, the scale of the problem is enormous - hundreds of thousands of children remain under Russian control, and the chance of returning those like Ostap remains low.

Tens of thousands of Ukrainian children are being abducted and forcibly taken to Russia to be deprived of their native identity. Nikita was one of them, and his grandmother was able to bring him home after months of searching and fighting the occupation system.

Анна Бальчінос