SBU Detains War Criminal for Forced Transportation of Ukrainian Children

The Security Service of Ukraine detained in Kyiv one of the organizers of the forced transportation of Ukrainian children to Russia and the temporarily occupied regions of Ukraine.

According to the agency, the suspect is a former teacher at a Kherson vocational school who collaborated with the Nazis during the occupation of the city. The offender was then appointed "deputy director" of the occupied Kherson Vocational School No. 2 and instructed to organize the forced transfer of six underage students to the temporarily occupied Crimea.

For this purpose, the children were first evicted from the school's dormitory and illegally taken to the left bank of Kherson region. From there, they were taken by bus to the territory of the temporarily occupied peninsula. The entire route of the Ukrainian children to their destination was "accompanied" by representatives of the occupation administration of the Russian Federation, who exerted constant psychological pressure. In Crimea, the children were "locked up" in one of the local camps. There, they were given pro-Kremlin literature and began to prepare them for further entry into the ranks of the Russian occupation groups.

According to the Prosecutor General's Office, for six months, the abducted children were moved through the occupied territory, forced to study under Russian programs, and purposefully prepared for service in the armed forces of the aggressor state. They were forcibly issued Russian passports, and one of them has even already been served with a draft notice to serve in the army.

After the liberation of Kherson, the suspects left for Kyiv, where they hoped to "get lost" to avoid justice. SBU officers located the former occupation official, documented her crimes and detained her at her place of residence.

The SBU investigators served the detainee a notice of suspicion of committing a war crime committed by a group of persons by prior conspiracy.

The offender is in custody without the right to be released on bail. She faces up to 12 years in prison.

Photo: Office of the Prosecutor General

Her accomplices were also served war crime notices in absentia: the former occupation "director" of a Kherson vocational school and his subordinate "teacher" who are hiding in the temporarily occupied part of Ukraine.

Олеся Ланцман