Russia is preparing Ukrainian children from occupied territories to fight in its war
High-ranking Russian officers are running military training programs for Ukrainian children from occupied territories and overseeing a system of youth militarization, an investigation by the Kyiv Indepndent has found.
The programs are organized by the Warrior Center for Military and Patriotic Education — a network created in 2022 by direct order of Vladimir Putin.
An investigation by the Kyiv Independent's War Crimes Unit revealed that Ukrainian teenagers from occupied parts of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Luhansk, and Donetsk oblasts undergo military training run by the Warrior Center at the Avangard Defense and Sports Camp in Russia’s Volgograd region.
The center places the teenagers in military training camps called “Time of Young Heroes,” one of which explicitly aims to prepare youth for service in Russia’s Armed Forces.
In the camps, Ukrainian children are subjected to harsh discipline and combat-style drills. They are trained to operate drones, dig trenches, mine and demine areas, and use grenades and firearms.
In exclusive testimony shared with Kyiv Independent, Oksana a girl from southern Ukraine who went through the training in 2024 when she was 16. Her name has been changed for her protection.
The investigation further identified the center’s leadership structure:
The head of the Warrior Center’s supervisory board is Viktor Vodolatsky, a Russian State Duma deputy who holds a medal for what Russia calls the "liberation" of occupied Crimea and Sevastopol. Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, Vodolatsky has visited occupied eastern Ukraine, inspected Russian-installed administrations, and publicly called for the destruction of Ukraine’s Armed Forces.
His deputy and the commander of the Warrior Center, Andranik Gasparyan, is a colonel in the Russian Armed Forces and a veteran of the wars in Chechnya, Syria, and Crimea. He has received two Orders of Courage and previously commanded Russia’s 126th Coastal Defense Brigade. From the first days of the full-scale invasion, his unit participated in the occupation of southern Ukraine.
Ukrainian prosecutors have issued indictments in absentia against Gasparyan’s subordinates for war crimes, including beatings, abductions, killings of civilians, mock executions, and the rape of a minor.
The Kyiv Independent identified at least 25 instructors of the Warrior Center who directly trained Ukrainian children in Volgograd. Most had taken part in Russia’s war against Ukraine.
The Volgograd branch of the Warrior Center is headed by Igor Vorobyov, a former lieutenant colonel in Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service who spent 20 years in the system before volunteering to fight in Ukraine in 2022.
Serving in the 20th Guards Motor Rifle Division, he commanded an assault unit during the battles for Maryinka in Donetsk Oblast. After being wounded, Vorobyov returned to Volgograd, where he later took charge of the local Warrior Center branch.
One of the instructors is Yegor Sokov, a former Wagner Group fighter who took part in the battles for the now-occupied towns of Soledar and Popasna in Donetsk Oblast. Sokov has been awarded the Order of Courage and a military merit star from the Central African Republic. He now teaches radio communications to children from occupied territories.
One of them, Anatolii Yushko from Donetsk, was still a schoolboy when Russia invaded in 2014. Yushko went through Russia’s indoctrination programs and joined the Youth Army (Yunarmiya), Russian military-patriotic movement for children and teenagers.
At 19, he volunteered to fight in the invasion of Ukraine, taking part in the occupation of parts of Zaporizhzhia Oblast. After demobilization, he began training children at the Warrior Center.
In 2024 alone, 1,290 Ukrainian children from occupied territories went through militarization programs run by the Warrior Center in Volgograd.
Olesia Bida
