More than 6,000 Ukrainian children between the ages of four months and 17 years have been sent by Russia to re-education camps or into the Russian foster care system, according to a study funded by the US State Department.
According to the study developed by Yale University, Russia has sent these thousands of Ukrainian minors to these camps or other facilities since the start of the invasion of Ukrainian territory on February 24, 2022.
At a press conference, specialist Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of the Yale Humanitarian Research Laboratory, indicated that he had “evidence” that Russia had violated the Geneva Convention and “other elements” of international law on the rights of minors and their protection in an armed conflict.
According to the investigation, Moscow keeps Ukrainian minors in 43 centers, of which 41 were used in the past for children’s summer camps.
Raymond also specified that “78% of the facilities carry out some type of re-education of Ukrainian minors, mainly from areas such as Donetsk and Lugansk” in eastern Ukraine.
The expert added that there are other minors who have confirmed that they have been placed in Russian foster homes and orphanages.
Nathaniel Raymond also drew attention to the “massive” geographical scope of these Russian activities, since the centers where Ukrainian minors are sent exist in various places, such as the Crimean peninsula -occupied by Russia in 2014-, Moscow, the Sea Black and Siberian. .
And there’s even such a facility in Magadan, on Russia’s Pacific coast, “closer to the American mainland than to Moscow,” Raymond observed.
The expert explained that there are two groups of minors involved in this process, one of which is made up of children from Donetsk and Lugansk, who make up the majority of the 6,000 children whose number was calculated based on reports of transfers to re-education camps. .
The second includes what Russia calls “evacuees” from Kherson, Kharkov and Zaporizhia, who Nathaniel Raymond says are being placed in the Russian reception system.
The US expert noted that it was possible to identify around 32 centers where “systematic re-education efforts” are underway to “expose” Ukrainian minors to military education, in addition to Russian academic education and cultural patriotism.
Another person in charge of the North American study, Caitlin Howarth, explained that when talking about military training, it is not about minors sitting in a classroom listening to what their instructors say, but it consists of “handling firearms.”
“We have video images and photographs (of the minors) traveling through roads with obstacles, in physical training, driving vehicles and weapons,” he said.
Raymond concluded that, with these acts, Russia is taking a comprehensive approach at the government level to re-educate, relocate and carry out forced adoptions of Ukrainian minors.
“This is exactly consistent with what some of the early trials of elements of the Nazi regime before the Nuremberg tribunal presumed. There is certainly no confusion in international law: Russia’s actions are illegal and may constitute a war crime and a crime against humanity.” , he claimed.
Source: TSF
