The Russians transported several dozen Ukrainian children from the occupied Ukrainian territories to Belarus. The minors were sent to “emergency survival training” with Belarusian military personnel, according to Politico, citing Belarusian media.
“The Belarus 4 Mogilev state television channel reported on Wednesday that 35 children from the city of Antratsyt in eastern Ukraine, which Russia has occupied since 2014, were sent to the eastern Belarusian city of Mogilev, where they were taught “how to behave in extreme situations” in exercises with the Belarusian military,” the publication writes.
Belarusian media showed children, some dressed in sports suits with Russian flags on their sleeves. The minors hold on to each other and cover their faces during fire drills.
In December, self-proclaimed Belarusian President Lukashenko, who provided the country’s territory to Russia for the war against Ukraine, met with a group of deported Ukrainian children, promising to “embrace these children, bring them to our home, keep them warm and make their childhood happier.”
Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the Russian occupation authorities have deported thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia and Belarus from temporarily occupied territories, according to Politico. However, Moscow began deporting Ukrainian children even before the full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022. Since 2014, human rights advocates estimate that Russia has deported over 1.5 million minors.
In April, the Council of Europe named the forcible transfer and russification of Ukrainian children as “evidence of a genocide.”
In November, it was reported that the Russians in the occupied territories of Ukraine received instructions from the Kremlin to prepare new lists of children who do not have guardianship for further deportation, the National Resistance Center said.
On March 17, 2023, the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for the arrest of the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, as well as Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, who is Russia’s Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights.
Putin and Lvova-Belova are suspected of committing the war crime of illegal deportation and transfer of children from the occupied regions of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, which took place at least since February 24, 2022.
Cover: mogilev.mchs.gov.by (Courtesy Photo)
