February 15, 2023
By Jonathan Landay and Simon Lewis
A pedestrian walks near a board, which displays the symbol "Z" in support of the Russian armed forces involved in the country's military campaign in Ukraine, in the settlement of Chernomorskoye, Crimea, February 11, 2023. A sign on the board reads: "We don't abandon our people". REUTERS/Alexey Pavlishak
WASHINGTON, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Russia has held at least 6,000
Ukrainian children - likely many more - in sites in Russian-held Crimea and
Russia whose primary purpose appears to be political re-education, according to
a U.S.-backed report published on Tuesday.
The report said Yale
University researchers had identified at least 43 camps and other facilities
where Ukrainian children have been held that were part of a "large-scale
systematic network" operated by Moscow since its February 2022 invasion of
Ukraine.
The children included those with
parents or clear familial guardianship, those Russia deemed orphans, others who
were in the care of Ukrainian state institutions before the invasion and those
whose custody was unclear or uncertain due to the war, it said.
"The primary purpose of the camp
facilities we've identified appears to be political re-education,"
Nathaniel Raymond, one of the researchers, said in a briefing to reporters.
Some of the children were moved through the system and adopted
by Russian families, or moved into foster care in Russia, the report said.
The youngest child identified in
the Russian program was just four months old, and some camps were giving
military training to children as young as 14 years, Raymond said, adding that
researchers had not found evidence those children were later deployed in
combat.
Russia's embassy in Washington,
responding to the reports that Russia forcefully holds children, said Russia
accepts children who were forced to flee Ukraine.
"We do our best to keep underage
people in families, and in cases of absence or death of parents and relatives -
to transfer orphans under guardianship," the embassy said on the Telegram
messaging platform.
It also reiterated Russia's
allegations that Ukraine, using Western weapons, strikes civilian
infrastructure.
Moscow has denied intentionally
targeting civilians in what it calls a "special military operation"
in Ukraine, and has pushed back against previous claims that it had forcibly
moved Ukrainians.
The report was the latest produced
by the Yale University School of Public Health's Humanitarian Research Lab as
part of a State Department-backed project that has examined human rights violations and war crimes allegedly committed by Russia.
"What is documented in this
report is a clear violation of the 4th Geneva Convention," the agreement
that protects civilians in wartime, said Raymond.
He said it could also be evidence
that Russia has committed genocide during its war in Ukraine, since the
transfer of children for purposes of changing, altering or eliminating national
identity can constitute a component act of the crime of genocide.
Ukrainian prosecutors have said
they are examining allegations of forced
deportation of children as part of efforts to build a genocide
indictment against Russia.
"This network stretches from
one end of Russia to the other," Raymond said, adding that researchers
believed that the number of facilities in which Ukrainian children have been
held exceeds 43.
The system of camps and the
adoption by Russian families of Ukrainian children taken from their homeland
"appears to be authorized and coordinated at the highest levels of
Russia's government," the report said, beginning with President Vladimir
Putin and extending to local officials.
State Department spokesperson Ned
Price indicated that action could be taken against 12 individuals the report
said are not yet under U.S. sanctions.
"We are always looking at
individuals who may be responsible for war crimes, for atrocities inside of
Ukraine," he said.
"Just because we have not
sanctioned an individual to date says nothing about any future action that we
may take."
Reporting by Jonathan Landay and Simon Lewis Additional
reporting by Lidia Kelly; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Himani Sarkar
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-backed-report-says-russia-has-held-least-6000-ukrainian-children-re-education-2023-02-14/
No comments:
Post a Comment