cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/33196646
Since the start of the full-scale invasion, Russia has taken at least 744,000 Ukrainian children to its territory, mostly accompanied by their parents, according to Daria Zarivna, Head of the Bring Kids Back UA initiative. Her remarks were published in an Espresso interview on April 19.
“Before the full-scale invasion, Ukraine had approximately seven million children. According to human rights organizations, about 1.6 million children remain in temporarily occupied territories. Russia has stated that it took at least 744,000 children to its territory, mostly with their parents,” Zarivna said.
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Due to the lack of access, it is unclear how many children have died, how many have been separated from their parents, or how many were born after February 2022.
According to official Ukrainian data, 19,546 cases of unlawful deportation or forced displacement of children have been documented. “The real number is much higher, but Russia blocks access to information, preventing a full assessment of the scale of this crime,” Zarivna added.
Through the Bring Kids Back UA initiative, Ukraine has managed to return 1,269 children—449 over the past year, and 18 in March 2025 alone.
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Children are taken to filtration camps or sent deeper into occupied regions, where they are housed in “re-education camps,” orphanages, or medical facilities.
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In other instances, children are forcibly taken from institutions. “Russia abducted 48 children from the Kherson Infant Home alone, many of whom have already been adopted by Russian families,” Zarivna said.
One example cited in the interview involved 17-year-old Vlad Rudenko from the Kherson region. Russian soldiers entered his home while he was alone, ordered him to pack his belongings, and transported him and his siblings to a military college in Crimea. Only months later was his mother able to locate him and begin the process to bring him home.
Earlier, Ukraine’s Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets reported that over 3,000 children were forcibly deported from occupied areas of Kherson during the summer of 2024 under the pretense of “vacation” programs. According to his statement, the children were taken to camps in remote Russian regions, where they were subjected to “re-education” activities aimed at erasing their Ukrainian identity.