Deportations and forcible transfers of Ukrainian children and other civilians to the Russian Federation or to temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories: create conditions for their safe return, stop these crimes and punish the perpetrators
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Assembly
debate on 27 April 2023 (13th sitting) (see Doc. 15748, report of the Committee on Migration, Refugees and
Displaced Persons, rapporteur: Mr Paolo Pisco; and oral opinion
of the Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development,
rapporteur: Ms Carmen Leyte). Text adopted
by the Assembly on 27 April 2023 (13th sitting).See
also Recommendation 2253
(2023).
1. The full-scale war of aggression
waged by the Russian Federation against Ukraine represents a massive and
ongoing violation of international law and a tragedy of human suffering.
The forced displacement of Ukrainian civilians, particularly of
children from an early age up to 17 years, to the Russian Federation
or within temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories, is an especially
serious feature of this aggression. Immediate action is required
as a matter of urgency, backed up by documentation and monitoring
of what has occurred and continues to occur, the establishment of
accountability and the bringing to justice of all the perpetrators,
at all levels of responsibility.
2. The United Nations, the Council of Europe, the European Parliament
and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe have
firmly condemned, over recent months and weeks, the practice of
forcible transfer and deportation of civilians, in particular children,
by the Russian Federation. While imposing these practices, the Russian
Federation often forces Russian citizenship on them, which also
leads to violation of the children’s right to identity and promotes
illegal adoptions of Ukrainian children by Russian families. Such practices
are prohibited under international humanitarian, human rights and
criminal law and deserve prosecution as war crimes and crimes against
humanity. In the case of forcibly transferred children, the crime of
genocide has reared its head and must be thoroughly investigated
and prosecuted.
3. The Ukrainian authorities and national and international human
rights organisations are working intensively to document and investigate
the forcible transfer and deportation of civilians and to find,
support and extricate the victims and reunite them with their families
and home environments. Their efforts are hampered by the extremely
difficult, hostile context and conditions of subterfuge under which
the Russian Federation is applying these practices.
4. The practice of unlawful deportations of Ukrainians to the
Russian Federation from the temporarily occupied territories in
the Donetsk and Luhansk regions had started before the Russian Federation’s
full-scale aggression against Ukraine began on 24 February 2022,
taking the form of deportation to the Russian Federation of children
from orphanages and of children with disabilities from specialised
institutions. These practices have intensified and evolved further
since that date and are clearly being planned and organised in a
systematic way, within the framework of a State policy. They involve
all levels of political decision making from the top down and implementation
by administrative bodies and State institutions of the Russian Federation,
especially as regards the forcible transfer, deportation and indoctrination
of Ukrainian children.
5. In determining the extent and scale of the forcible transfers
and deportations, precise figures are difficult to establish given
the ongoing aggression, lack of access to the temporarily occupied
territories of Ukraine and subterfuge on the part of the Russian
Federation as to the circumstances of forcible transfers and deportations and
the current whereabouts of the victims. Nonetheless, various sources
and data demonstrate that many thousands of Ukrainians are victims
of such practices and that the human cost and consequences of these practices,
today and for the future, are immense. As of mid-April 2023, the
Ukrainian Government stated that it had collected reports of over
19 384 children classified as “deported” to the Russian Federation,
only 361 of whom have since returned home, according to the authorities.
Therefore, there are still many thousands of children and other
civilians whose fate must be clarified.
6. The Parliamentary Assembly condemns the actions of the Russian
authorities in violation of their obligations under international
humanitarian law, which consist in unjustified delays in the repatriation
of children and obstacles to the reunification of families separated
as a result of this armed conflict. It also condemns the violation
of the rights of deported Ukrainian children to preserve their identity,
defined by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child
(Article 8), by the practice of forced acceptance of Russian citizenship
and placement of children for upbringing in the families of citizens
of the Russian Federation.
7. Despite the difficulties in establishing definitive data on
numbers involved or on the current fate of the victims, the evidence
indicates various practices which are widely reported by victims
and witnesses and which point to systematic policy by the Russian
Federation. These include:
7.1 through
the deliberate targeting and destruction of civilian infrastructure,
extreme pressure being exerted by the Russian military and Russian-affiliated
officials to force Ukrainian civilians to flee hostilities with
only the option of relocation to the Russian Federation, to Russian-occupied
territories of Ukraine or to Belarus;
7.2 “filtration” of Ukrainian civilians by the Russian military
and Russian-affiliated officials, including intrusive searches of
their bodies and belongings, aggressive interrogation and the extraction
of vast amounts of personal and biometric data. In some cases, civilians
have been subjected to torture and ill-treatment; many have been
detained and some have disappeared, according to family members;
7.3 the forcible transfer of children to the Russian Federation
and within temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, to be placed
in foster families, Russian-run orphanages or residential facilities, including
“summer camps”, and the facilitation of adoption of such children
by Russian families. This includes orphans and children with disabilities,
as well as children who have been moved either with or without their
parents and children whose parents have agreed to let the occupying
authorities transport them to “holiday” camps from which they have
never returned;
7.4 the practice of “re-education” of the children thus removed
from their homes and families, both in residential facilities and
in foster or adoptive families. This practice is called “russification”,
which implies a prohibition from speaking the Ukrainian language
or expressing in any way their Ukrainian identity and culture, compulsory
exposure to the Russian language and culture through classes, blanket
exposure to the prevailing propaganda through the media, teaching
of the Russian version of history, visits to “patriotic” sites,
military training and denigration of the Ukrainian language, culture
and history. In some cases, children have been (often falsely) informed
that their parents have died; most have no means of knowing where
they are or how to contact their families or obtain any help, and
many suffer from bullying and psychological harassment.
8. The organised and systematic nature of the practices involved
and the similar characteristics of such operations, both geographically
(across different temporarily occupied regions) and over time (including
before the full-scale aggression which began in February 2022),
point to the conclusion that these crimes are neither random nor
unplanned. These crimes indicate an intention to destroy Ukraine
and the Ukrainian identity as well as the cultural and linguistic
characteristics of its people. The forcible transfers, unlawful
deportations and “re-education” of children, who are especially
vulnerable and in need of protection, are abhorrent in their aim
of annihilating the children’s every link to and feature of their
Ukrainian identity.
9. The Assembly notes that both the Russian Federation and Ukraine
are signatories to the most relevant humanitarian law treaties that
apply to international armed conflicts: the Geneva Convention relative
to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (Geneva Convention
IV, 1949) and the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions
of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of
International Armed Conflicts (Protocol I, 1977). Other relevant
international treaties include the United Nations Charter (1945),
the Council of Europe European Convention on Human Rights (ETS No.
5, 1950), the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
(1966), the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 with respect to the
Laws and Customs of War on Land, the Convention on the Prevention
and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Genocide Convention, 1948),
the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (1998), the
International Convention for Protection of All Persons from Enforced
Disappearance (2010) and the United Nations Convention on the Rights
of the Child (1989) and its additional protocols.
10. The Assembly underscores that the forcible transfer of children
from one group to another group, with the intention to destroy,
totally or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group
is considered as a crime of genocide under Article 2, paragraph
(e), of the Genocide Convention, which matches with the documented evidence
of deportation and forcible transfer of Ukrainian children to the
Russian Federation or territories temporarily under Russian occupation.
11. The Assembly further recalls its
Resolution 2367 (2021) “The protection
of victims of arbitrary displacement”, its
Resolution 2448 (2022) “Humanitarian
consequences and internal and external displacement in connection
with the aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine” and
its
Resolution 2482 (2023) “Legal
and human rights aspects of the Russian Federation’s aggression
against Ukraine”, which refers,
inter
alia, to the Genocide Convention as regards the forcible
transfer of children.
12. The Assembly welcomes the International Criminal Court’s decision
of 17 March 2023 to issue arrest warrants against the President
of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, and the Russian Commissioner
for Children’s Rights, Maria Lvova-Belova, for the war crimes of
unlawful deportation and transfer of populations, in particular
children, from temporarily occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian
Federation.
13. The Assembly supports the Secretary General of the Council
of Europe in calling for a role to be played by this Organisation
in determining accountability and securing justice for the Russian
Federation’s aggression against Ukraine, including the establishment,
in co-operation with Ukraine, of an international register of damage
to serve as a record, in documentary form, of evidence and claims
of damage, loss or injury to all natural and legal persons concerned,
as well as the State of Ukraine, caused by internationally wrongful
acts of the Russian Federation in or against Ukraine, as well as
to promote and co-ordinate the gathering of evidence.
14. The Assembly also supports the need for thorough recording,
gathering and assessment of evidence of the crime of genocide as
provided for by both the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention.
The Assembly supports the investigation and prosecution of the State
policy of forcible transfers and deportation of Ukrainian children
by the Russian Federation and Ukraine’s potential actions before
the International Criminal Court and the International Court of
Justice.
15. The Assembly further supports the recommendations put forward
in March 2023 by the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council
of Europe, calling for the establishment of concrete mechanisms
and solutions to reunite the children with their families, including
through the identification and registration of unaccompanied and
separated children from Ukraine and the facilitation of family tracing
and reunification procedures.
16. In the light of all the above, the Assembly calls for immediate
and urgent action to be taken to halt the practices of unlawful
forcible transfer and deportation currently being carried out by
the Russian Federation against the Ukrainian population, and especially
its policy and practices relating to the removal of children from their
families and homes and their subsequent absorption into Russian
society and culture and the imposition of Russian identity. The
Assembly highlights the need for the recording and monitoring of
individual cases, both in order to permit mechanisms for rapid redress
and to collect evidence of accountability in order to bring the perpetrators,
at all levels of responsibility, to justice.
17. The Assembly calls upon the Russian Federation to:
17.1 as concerns the particularly
urgent situation of Ukrainian children in the hands of the Russian Federation,
cease immediately and unconditionally unlawful forcible transfer
and deportation of Ukrainian children to the Russian Federation,
Belarus or within temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories; halt
any adoption procedures underway; stop the imposition of Russian
citizenship; re-establish the children’s links with their parents
or carers and repatriate them to their homeland or release them
to a safe third country;
17.2 provide representatives and staff of relevant United Nations
bodies and other international human rights and humanitarian mechanisms
and organisations, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross,
with unhindered, immediate and safe access; provide reliable and
comprehensive information about the number and the whereabouts of
Ukrainian children; and ensure their dignified treatment and their
safe return;
17.3 fully co-operate with the Committee on the Rights of the
Child of the United Nations in the establishment of facts on the
basis of the report submitted to the latter by Human Rights Watch
in November 2022 on the review of Russia’s compliance with the Convention
on the Rights of the Child;
17.4 halt all practices linked to the process of “filtration”,
unlawful deportation and forcible transfer of civilians and other
protected persons from Ukrainian territories and release all those
that are still in “filtration” points; ensure that evacuation of
civilians from danger zones is on the basis of their full knowledge
and consent and with the option of relocating within Ukraine or
to safe destinations of their choice.
18. The Assembly calls on the international community to denounce
firmly and consistently and to take every measure possible to prevent
the continuation of these crimes, to support the Ukrainian authorities
and others in the diligent collection of evidence and proof, and
to ensure that the perpetrators at all levels are identified and
brought to justice. It also calls on:
18.1 the States Parties to the Rome Statute to take every possible
action to fulfil their obligations to enforce the arrest warrants
already issued by the International Criminal Court and to support
the prosecution and bringing to justice of all other responsible
persons. In particular, named individuals for whom direct responsibility
has been alleged by international human rights organisations include
the Russian Federation’s Prime Minister, the ministers of education
and health, the Commissioner for Human Rights and the First Deputy
Chief of Staff of the Russian President’s Executive Office, the
self-proclaimed President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, and,
at regional level, the governors of Krasnodar Krai, Magadan, Kamchatka
Krai, the President of Tatarstan and the head of the Republic of Adygea;
18.2 the International Criminal Court to examine with all due
seriousness the possible prosecution of the crime of genocide as
regards the State policy of the Russian Federation towards Ukrainian
children currently within its hands and to encourage States Parties
to consider bringing prosecutions for all crimes within their national
criminal courts where jurisdiction is possible (in Ukraine or in
third-party courts with universal jurisdiction);
18.3 the authorities of Ukraine to ensure that Ukrainian nationals
who have been forcibly transferred to Russia, including men between
the ages of 18 and 60, suffer no legal consequences for such transfer upon
returning to Ukraine;
18.4 the international community to strengthen co-operation
with the European Union in order to stop the crimes of forcible
transfer and deportations of Ukrainian civilians by the Russian
Federation, to create conditions for the Ukrainian children’s safe
return or settlement in a safe third country in Europe, to prevent
the adoption of Ukrainian children with illegal alleged Russian
citizenship by citizens of Council of Europe member States, and
to punish the perpetrators, as underscored in the Council of the
European Union and the European Commission statements at the European
Parliament on 19 April 2023.
19. The Assembly calls upon the Council of Europe member States
to:
19.1 give all possible political
and financial support to the Council of Europe mechanisms and measures
put in place to support its member State, Ukraine, at the present
time, including the Action Plan for Ukraine “Resilience, Recovery
and Reconstruction” (2023-2026) and the Expert Advisory Group to
the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine;
19.2 support Ukraine in its efforts to document and monitor
the situation of Ukrainian citizens, and especially children, who
have been forcibly displaced or deported by the Russian Federation,
and to lend their political, logistical and financial support to
the development of an effective and rapid mechanism to identify,
locate and repatriate victims to Ukraine or to a safe third country;
19.3 in this endeavour, provide support and assistance in strengthening
co-ordination between all the relevant national bodies and institutions
in Ukraine and to the work of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner
for Human Rights;
19.4 support the Ukrainian authorities in the development of
a rapid mechanism to identify, locate and repatriate victims to
Ukraine or to a safe third country, including by strengthening the
“Children of War” platform and by promoting the “Reunite Ukraine”
application, and to provide returning children with the necessary
support, in particular emergency and continuing psychological support;
19.5 ensure that the Temporary Protection Directive (2001/55/EC)
by European Union member States and other temporary protection measures
are effectively applied to all Ukrainians who are seeking entry at
European Union borders with the Russian Federation, with or without
valid or undamaged travel documents;
19.6 support and facilitate the work of civil society organisations
active in protecting the rights of Ukrainian citizens, displaced
persons and refugees;
19.7 strengthen the work of strategic communications units
and the independent media that contribute to debunking Russian disinformation
campaigns, as disseminating the facts about Russia’s crimes is essential
to assisting the victims and restoring justice.
20. Underpinning all the above, and over and beyond the immediate
measures which must be taken to protect Ukrainian civilians and
children today, the Assembly stresses once more that the perpetrators
of crimes under international law, including the crime of aggression
against another country, war crimes, crimes against humanity and
genocide, must be identified and brought to justice. On the eve
of the 4th Summit of Heads of State and Government of the Council
of Europe in Reykjavik, it calls upon member States, and upon the international
community as a whole, to proclaim and reassert their commitment
to this objective, to rapidly establish the mechanisms and processes
which are needed to reach this end and to remain steadfast in their common
endeavours to ensure that justice is served.
