A new report managed to identify 210 sites where Russia relocated Ukrainian children after forcibly abducting them in the aftermath of the war with Ukraine, a vast deportation programme that has already cost an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The report was made by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) and used mixed sources, including satellite images and open-source information. The research indicated that approximately half of the facilities are operated by the Russian government. It also highlights that most likely, there are many more facilities where Ukrainian children are placed. According to the report, what they uncovered is “the highest number of locations to which children from Ukraine have been taken.”
Russia’s position has always been that they do not force people to move, and children are moved away from active war zones for their protection. Ukraine claims that Russia forcibly deported more than 19,500 children to Russia and Belarus. Figures from HRL estimate the actual number at around 35,000.
Yale’s researcher already in 2023 identified 43 camps where Ukrainian children were deported. Among the facilities identified in the new report, there are cadet schools, a military base, medical facilities, a religious site, secondary schools and universities, orphanages, camps and sanatoriums. At least 39 locations have been used for military training of the children.
According to the report, children aged from eight to eighteen went through militarisation programmes, including combat training, ceremonial parades and drills, assembly of drones and other materiel, and education in military history. At least one group of children has undergone airborne training.
So far, 1,600 deported children have been returned to Ukraine, according to figures from Kyiv. Just last Monday, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy‘s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, stated that 16 children had been returned.
