Up to 20,000 Ukrainian children remain in Russia after being illegally deported from Ukraine while most Europeans return home to spend their Easter break with their families, the Ukrainian vice minister told Euroneus.
“This is when people celebrate Easter with their family’s loved ones, and those children are left without their families. Many of them already don’t remember their parents because Russia is erasing their identity,” Mariana Bessa said.
“Ukrainian children are unnegotiable,” Bessa argued that peace negotiations and negotiations should include “the unconditional return of all children returning to Ukraine.”
Ukraine has been able to examine the deportation of Russia’s 19,546 children so far. These are the children whose detailed information was collected. The Ukrainian settlements and Russian territory locations are known.
Actual numbers can be much higher.
Yale’s humanitarian lab brings the number of deported Ukrainian children closer to 35,000. Moscow claimed that the number could reach 700,000.
The US Institute for War Think Tank Research (ISW) claims that the true number of deported children “but their meaning remains the same. Russia has been stolen, potentially hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian children being stolen with the explicit intention to eradicate Ukrainian identities and turn them into Russians.
Furthermore, ISW, which steals children, was one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s priorities, referring to the revelation of Ukrainian human rights activists.
They discovered Kremlin documents dated February 18, 2022, and made plans to remove Ukrainian children from orphanages in the occupied Luhansk and Donetsk regions and take them to Russia under the guise of “humanitarian evacuation.”
The documents reveal that Russia plans to target vulnerable Ukrainian children, especially those without parental care, before the full-scale invasion begins.
“In the next three years, Russia embarked on a deeply institutionalized project that directed the Kremlin to acquiesce Ukrainian children and force them to turn them into the next generation of Russians.”
Betsa says 1.6 million Ukrainian children are still in the territory that was temporarily occupied at this time.
What is happening now for deported Ukrainian children?
According to the Ukrainian deputy foreign minister, Russia has deliberately erased the identity of children who were illegally deported.
Betsa told Euronows that it would be difficult to track and identify these children, especially with regard to younger children who were forced to be adopted in Russia, as their names and IDs have changed.
With a full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the first deliberate deportation of Ukrainian children, President Putin signed the order for Ukraine’s “simplified procedures for the acquisition of Russian citizenship left behind without parental care and incompetent people.”
This amounts to legalizing the process of deporting Ukrainian children and forcing them to become Russian citizenship.
Russia uses children as “a tool for offensive policy against Ukraine.”
Yale’s humanitarian lab confirmed that Russia uses camps of at least 43 children across the country to accommodate deported children.
Russia uses these camps to indoctrinate Ukrainian children, “punishing Ukrainian identity and forcing Russian sentiment through a curriculum approved by the Kremlin and a curriculum that carefully curates “military patriotic” training courses.”
“Red Line” for Kiev’s “Red Line” to bring back deported children
In an interview with Euroneuz, the Ukrainian vice minister reiterated that peace is not just possible without the return of prisoners, those who were illegally detained, and all children.
“These are the red lines of Ukraine. All children should go home to Ukraine and return unconditionally,” Bessa said.
Previously, Volodymyr Zelenakyy announced that the issue was “a great priority for Kyiv in Saudi Arabia’s recent ceasefire negotiations with the United States.”
In a statement issued after consultations with Ukraine, the United States said it remains “committed” to return the forced-invited Ukrainian children, exchange prisoners and release civilian detainees.
However, the Trump administration cut funding for Yale University’s humanitarian lab. This investigated and detailed the massive deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia.
Under the 2022 contract with the lab, the US government took responsibility for the database. When the government cut off its assistance, lab team members lost access to the irreplaceable data they collected, including evidence of Russian war crimes.
The lab shared some of this evidence with European authorities and the International Criminal Court (ICC). This issued an arrest warrant to Putin and his Children’s Rights Committee Chairman Maria Levova Belova to force deport Ukrainian children.
In response to pressure from Congressional members, the Trump administration later restored research institute funding for about six weeks to properly hand over important data on children to the right authorities.
Betsa argues that it raises the issue of Ukraine being forced to deport in all negotiations. “Bilateral, multilateral within the Council of Europe, including international organizations, the United Nations, the Council of Europe, everywhere, bilateral conversations with the United States).
“These are the red lines of Ukraine. All children should return home to Ukraine unconditionally.”
