Russian independent internet outlet Verstka reported on Aug. 6 that the Russian Investigative Committee “took patronage” over Ukrainian children living in children‘s homes throughout Russia, the Institute for the Study of War said in their latest update.
According to Verstka, the committee sent its employees to 10 such homes with toys, clothes, and school supplies in order to coerce the children to enter the Russian cadet corps.
Verstka reported that Russia's chief federal investigator Alexander Bastrykin personally visited Ukrainian children in Russia and told them that Russian victory depend on the children and that the Russian Investigative Committee is there to support them.
Over 19,000 children have been illegally deported from occupied Ukrainian territories to Russia since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in February 2022, according to a Ukrainian database.
The Investigative Committee reportedly advertised the cadet corps to Ukrainian children from Donbas and said that 78 Ukrainian children entered educational institutions, including the cadet corps and academies affiliated with the Investigative Committee, between February 2022 and March 2023.
Verstka reported that Bastrykin ordered the cadet corps in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Volgograd to prepare to receive Ukrainian children from occupied Donbas as early as February 25, 2022.
"The coercion of Ukrainian children, who are legally unable to consent to their deportations and participation in such military-patriotic re-education programs, is likely part of an ongoing Russian campaign to eradicate the Ukrainian national identity and militarize youth who have been forcibly deported to Russia," the ISW said.
Olesia Bida
(Updated: )
