Nazis deported 20 thousand children from Ukraine to Russia and Crimea

The occupiers have deported at least 19,500 Ukrainian children to Russia and occupied Crimea, but the real number may reach hundreds of thousands. Some of the minors were sent to re-education camps and later to military centers.

This was reported by Krym.Realii with reference to the British Ministry of Defense.

According to the British Ministry of Defense, the Russian authorities have illegally deported more than 19.5 thousand children from Ukraine to Russia and occupied Crimea. According to some open sources, this figure may reach 35,000. About six thousand Ukrainian children were sent to a network of so-called re-education camps, and upon reaching the age of adolescence - to military training centers.

According to official figures, since the beginning of the full-scale war, more than 20,000 Ukrainian children have been held in Russia and the occupied territories. At the same time, the Verkhovna Rada Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets suggests that Russia has illegally taken about 150,000 minors, while the Commissioner for Children's Rights Daria Gerasymchuk has put the number at several hundred thousand, approximately 200-300,000.

In March 2023, the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Children's Ombudsman Maria Levova-Belova. They are suspected of war crimes - forced deportations and displacement of people, including children, from the occupied territories of Ukraine.

In July 2023, Lvivova-Belova herself stated that since the beginning of the invasion, Russia had allegedly taken in about 4.8 million Ukrainians, including more than 700,000 children. According to her, most of them allegedly came with their parents or relatives.

In March, Donald Trump' s administration stopped funding a special team that was searching for Ukrainian children illegally taken to Russia. Already in December last year, the War Crimes Research Laboratory released a report documenting 314 cases of abduction of Ukrainian children who were included in a systematic program of forced adoption and placement in foster care.

The aggressor is taking hundreds of children from Crimea, changing their personal data and transferring them to different regions of the country. Hundreds of profiles of children from Crimea, who were illegally taken after the beginning of the occupation, can still be found on Russian websites with adoption announcements.

Анна Бальчінос