Thousands of Ukrainian children living in orphanages have been forcibly transferred to Russia or occupied territories and many are listed on adoption ‘websites’, Human Rights Watch denounced today.
The human rights organization, which released a report today titled “We should provide a family, not rebuild orphanages,” presents documented cases of forced transfers of children from Ukrainian institutions to Russia or Russian-occupied territories.
“A war crime,” Human Rights Watch (HRW) points out.
Based on data from the Ukrainian government, the organisation noted that 100 institutions that housed more than 32,000 children before 2022 are now in regions under partial or full Russian occupation or that Moscow has declared annexed.
“Statements by Russian authorities, Ukrainian activists and lawyers, as well as press reports, indicate that at least several thousand children have been forcibly transferred to occupied territories or Russia,” HRW said, noting that the Russian parliament adopted legislation in May 2022 allowing authorities to grant Russian citizenship to Ukrainian children, facilitating their custody and adoption by families in Russia.
In addition, the organisation said, at least one Russian adoption website features children from Ukrainian regions, and Russian authorities have admitted that hundreds of Ukrainian children have been adopted.
This is happening “despite the fact that international standards prohibit international adoption during armed conflict,” HRW stressed.
Therefore, the organisation called, “Russia must grant access to the United Nations and other impartial agencies to identify these children, monitor their welfare and facilitate their return to Ukraine.”
“The war in Ukraine has had devastating consequences for children who were in residential institutions” such as orphanages, HRW added, warning that “many children have been forcibly transferred to Russia and separated from their families, suffering traumatic experiences of war and displacement.”
Ukraine had, prior to Russia’s invasion, Europe’s highest number of children in institutions, exceeding 105,000 minors, according to government figures.
The United Nations agency dedicated to children, Unicef, added that almost half were children with disabilities.
More than 09 out of 10 of these children who were in institutions in Ukraine have parents with full rights, HRW reports.
“They were institutionalised due to their families’ poverty or difficult life circumstances or because the child has a disability and institutions were presented as the best option,” the organisation explains.
“In reality, as the Ukrainian authorities have recognised, and as decades of studies show, institutions are inherently harmful to children. Human rights law requires the deinstitutionalisation of all children, including during armed conflict.”
Ukraine should, with international support, “urgently map the whereabouts of all children in institutions and ensure their well-being,” HRW called for.
While most children in institutions were sent home to their families when the Russian attacks began, “thousands have been taken to other institutions and just as many are in unknown whereabouts,” it stressed.
“Russia is responsible for the crisis faced by these [transferred] children, but the war increases the urgency for Ukraine, with the support of foreign governments and humanitarian agencies, to stop institutionalising children and expand family and community care,” HRW argued.
“Ukrainian children who were housed in Soviet-era institutions now face extreme risks due to Russia’s war in Ukraine,” warned one of the directors of the organisation’s children’s rights unit, Bill Van Esveld, quoted in the report.
“There needs to be a coordinated international effort to identify and return children deported to Russia, but Ukraine and its allies must ensure that all children who have been or remain institutionalised are identified and given support to return to live with their families and in their communities,” he concluded.
*with Lusa
