Russia Kidnapping Ukrainian Children, AP Report Claims.
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Russia Kidnapping Ukrainian Children, AP Report Claims.
Removed by modThousands of children have been found in the basements of war-torn cities like Mariupol and at orphanages in the Russian-backed separatist territories of Donbas. They include those whose parents were killed by Russian shelling as well as others in institutions or with foster families, known as “children of the state.”
Russia claims that these children don’t have parents or guardians to look after them, or that they can’t be reached. But the AP found that officials have deported Ukrainian children to Russia or Russian-held territories without consent, lied to them that they weren’t wanted by their parents, used them for propaganda, and given them Russian families and citizenship.
The investigation is the most extensive to date on the grab of Ukrainian children, and the first to follow the process all the way to those already growing up in Russia. The AP drew from dozens of interviews with parents, children and officials in both Ukraine and Russia; emails and letters; Russian documents and Russian state media.
Whether or not they have parents, raising the children of war in another country or culture can be a marker of genocide, an attempt to erase the very identity of an enemy nation.
Even where parents are dead, Rapp said, their children must be sheltered, fostered or adopted in Ukraine rather than deported to Russia.
Russian law prohibits the adoption of foreign children. But in May, Putin signed a decree making it easier for Russia to adopt and give citizenship to Ukrainian children without parental care — and harder for Ukraine and surviving relatives to win them back.
Russia also has prepared a register of suitable Russian families for Ukrainian children, and pays them for each child who gets citizenship — up to $1,000 for those with disabilities. It holds summer camps for Ukrainian orphans, offers “patriotic education” classes and even runs a hotline to pair Russian families with children from Donbas.
“It is absolutely a terrible story,” said Petro Andryushchenko, an adviser to the Mariupol mayor, who claims hundreds of children were taken from that city alone. “We don’t know if our children have an official parent or (stepparents) or something else because they are forcibly disappeared by Russian troops.”
Russia portrays its adoption of Ukrainian children as an act of generosity that gives new homes and medical resources to helpless minors. Russian state media shows local officials hugging and kissing them and handing them Russian passports.
It’s very hard to pin down the exact number of Ukrainian children deported to Russia — Ukrainian officials claim nearly 8,000. Russia hasn’t given an overall number, but officials regularly announce the arrival of Ukrainian orphans in Russian military planes.
In March, Russian children’s rights ombudswoman Maria Lvova-Belova said more than 1,000 children from Ukraine were in Russia. Over the summer, she said 120 Russian families had applied for guardianship, and more than 130 Ukrainian children had received Russian citizenship. Many more have come since, including a batch of 234 in early October.
She acknowledged that at first, a group of 30 children brought to Russia from the basements of Mariupol defiantly sang the Ukrainian national anthem and shouted, “Glory to Ukraine!” But now, she said, their criticism has been “transformed into a love for Russia,” and she herself has taken one in, a teenager.
The children of Mariupol aren’t the first Russia has been accused of stealing from Ukraine.
In 2014, after Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula, more than 80 children from Luhansk were stopped at checkpoints and abducted. Ukraine sued, and the European Court of Human Rights found the children were taken into Russia “without medical support or the necessary paperwork.” The children were returned to Ukraine before a final decision.
Kateryna Rashevska, a human rights defender, said she knows of about 30 Ukrainian children from Crimea adopted by Russians under a program known as Train of Hope. Now, she said, some of those children might well be Russian soldiers. Since 2015, the Young Army Cadets national movement has trained youth in Crimea and Russia for potential recruitment into the military.
This time around, at least 96 children have been returned to Ukraine since March after negotiations. But Ukrainian officials have tracked down the identities of thousands more in Russia, and the names of many others simply aren’t published.
It seems the Russians are actually just putting children in foster homes and really wherever they can, but the west is mistranslating it and labeling it as "russian abduction"
Yeah that's pretty much what I'm expecting but obviously some investigation is worthwhile. There's genuinely some worthwhile concern to have for children that may slip through the cracks in what is a monumental opportunity for anyone that wishes to do real harm. The disorganisation and potential for missing children is still quite high even with the best of intentions of the Russian state in taking these actions to protect children from a warzone.
It seems extremely disorganized but the minister leading the effort in a relatively new office seems to be doing a lot of legwork. Like, every day she is physically with a new group of orphans personally finding them some place to go that isn't just a bomb shelter near the front lines. Definitely more than what most politicians in the west would do, I give her that. Shes a capitalist politician of course.
of course, as stated, russia has a huge corruption problem, and kids may be taken by actual bad parties. But it isn't some government conspiracy to do this, or raise them as soldiers, or do this sort of thing. It makes me soothed to know that at the very least, even western media had to admit that the last time this exact thing happened, and like you said: all the children were returned. If even they can't put dampeners on this, then they really did what they claim.
There should be further protection to make sure all children are where they are supposed to be. This is Post-soviet Russia after all, and this is a far larger conflict. I think that goes without saying though.
Oh, so the last time they kidnapped children, they had to return them because Ukraine literally sued them and went to authorities like the European Court of Human Rights. Wow, that really proves Russia cares about the kids.
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I'd say if an invading force bombs a city, kills its people, then takes the surviving children away into their country and gives them away to strangers, then yeah, that is abduction.
what is your opinion on the ukraine war, because it sounds very... sus. Your framing is lacking nuance, and aligns with western narratives. That city was full of fucking nazis I think eliminating them and their fortress is completely and utterly justified in every single case.
and again, it is an evacuation. And by the account of the person you linked, it is a sane one, trying to get kids fostered and housed to escape the war that is currently going on. If they can't house them with relatives, yes it is okay to try to temporarily house them with others. I'm not supporting some sort of cultural erasure, I'm supporting sane ideas to get children out of warzones, which is what's happening.
One of the claims of the article is that Russia is denying returning the vast majority of those kids to Ukraine when Ukraine demands it. That is definitely kidnapping and wrong, no?
On the Ukraine war, it should be ended as soon as possible, with whatever negotiations are needed so that the deaths are stopped and people can be safe. US and the West will fight Russia using Ukraine till literally every Ukrainian is dead and Russia isn't going grow a moral backbone and back down either. That will only lead to more death and destruction.