cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/38491622
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Many [Ukrainian] children were moved to Russian territories under the guise of vacation, education, or medical care. Some were placed in camps posing as integration programs, others were adopted into Russian families, stripped of their identities, and reissued new documents. In Russian schools, they’re banned from speaking Ukrainian, exposed to propaganda, and often recruited into the Youth Army.
This policy dates back to 2014, after Russia occupied Crimea and parts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, but has intensified. Many of the children taken were not orphans, despite Russian claims. Most had living parents or relatives. Some were institutionalized, others were seized after parents were detained or separated.
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Anatolii’s [not his real name] story is one of many such stories that fortunately ended with Save Ukraine being able to bring him back.
At 17, he was taken straight from school by Russian forces. A week before his 18th birthday, Anatolii was handed a conscription notice from the Russian army—with no real choice but to serve [...] Anatolii stayed behind in a southern Ukrainian town after his brother fled.
He became a target after he and his brother found two boxes of ammunition in a forest and threw them away. FSB agents later detained and beat him, demanding the weapons and names of Ukrainian soldiers. One day, they dragged him from the principal’s office, tied him up, put a bag over his head, and took him to be tortured.
“They broke my rib and shoulder joint, smashed my face, gave me lots of bruises… They said: ‘If we find anything on your phone—you won’t live.'”
At school, Anatolii was taught to shoot and handle explosives. Russians offered him trips to military camps, but he kept refusing.
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In Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, the Kremlin is waging a long-term campaign to erase Ukrainian identity and reshape the next generation into loyal subjects of the Russian state. Central to this effort is the militarization of children through schools, propaganda, and paramilitary training.
In classrooms, Ukrainian curricula are being replaced with Russian textbooks. The language, culture, and history of Ukraine are banned or distorted. Weekly indoctrination sessions known as “Conversations About the Important” push pro-Kremlin narratives and glorify military service. Children are taught to view Ukraine and the West as enemies.
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Recruitment into these programs doesn’t focus on academic performance or discipline. Instead, students with aggressive behavior, bullying records, or emotional instability are often targeted, pointing to a disturbing strategy to raise a generation predisposed to violence and deeply indoctrinated with hostility toward NATO and the United States.
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In 2016, Russia’s Defense Ministry launched a youth “military-patriotic” organization called Yunarmiya, or in English, Young Army. In reality, it’s a militarized movement that instills the ideology of Russian aggression and grooms future soldiers for the occupying regime.
Children as young as eight are enrolled. They’re made to swear an oath of loyalty to Russia, promise to “defend its interests,” and embrace “great patriotism.” After that, they undergo firearms and tactical training, learn to operate drones, and more.
Ashley Jordana, Hala Systems’ Director of Law, Policy and Human Rights, said Hala’s assessment, based on geolocation data from mobile phones traced to Yunarmiya bases and testimonies from survivors, suggests cadets are roused daily at 6 am. After a canteen breakfast of eggs and oatmeal, they attend classes in firearms assembly, mine clearance, and military tactics.
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In Crimea, occupied since 2014, Russian authorities dismantled Ukrainian education and launched programs like The Train of Hope to assimilate children. The programme is a Russian state-run initiative launched in occupied Crimea that facilitates the adoption of Ukrainian children by Russian families. Monuments to Russian weapons designers were erected on school grounds, and a 2014 doctrine officially linked education to military preparation.
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Some of the children indoctrinated after 2014 are now dying on the battlefield, celebrated as heroes in Russian propaganda. One such case is 16-year-old Illia Moskvitin, a Youth Army member from occupied Donetsk, who was killed by a landmine in 2022. Others, like Ivan Shifman and Dmytro Kotov, joined Russian forces after years of ideological grooming.
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Dmytro Kotov: In 2015, he graduated from Gymnasium №6 in Dzhankoi, temporarily occupied Crimea. Russia later sent him to Yunarmiya, according to open-source data. After completing his studies at the Sevastopol State Technical University, Kotov signed a contract with the Russian military and served aboard the large landing ship Novocherkassk, part of the 197th Brigade of the Black Sea Fleet. Dmytro died on March 24, 2022, while participating in Russia’s war against Ukraine.
Illia Moskvitin was also a member of the Yunarmiya unit operating in the Russian-occupied Donetsk region. Illia died on April 14, 2022, before even reaching the age of 16, after stepping on a Lepestok anti-personnel mine, according to materials published by the Yunarmiya organization.
Ivan Shifman, a student at School №1 in the city of Kalmiuske in the Donetsk region, joined Yunarmiya in 2019. After turning 18, he enlisted in the so-called “People’s Militia of the Donetsk People’s Republic” and began serving in Russia’s 1st Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade. Following the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Ivan took part in combat operations in several towns across the Donetsk region, including Starohnativka, Hranitne, Malyi Yanisol, Zaitseve, and Rozivka. Ivan was killed in action near the village of Novobakhmutivka along the front line in Donetsk on April 14, 2022—the same day as Illia.
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** What needs to be done to prevent it**
The evidence gathered in this article barely touches the surface of this issue, but it shows how Russia’s child abductions are a systemic state policy.
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants in March 2023 for Russian leader Vladimir Putin and Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights Maria Lvova-Belova for their roles in the deportations, an act that constitutes a war crime under international law.
Both are suspected of committing the war crime of unlawfully deporting children from occupied Ukrainian territories to Russia—an operation the court says has been underway since at least February 24, 2022.
A historic moment in international law unfolded in Strasbourg on June 25, 2025, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Council of Europe Secretary General Alain Berset formally launched the Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression Against Ukraine, established in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion.
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