Women, children forcibly taken out of occupied territories of Donbas to Russia – Denisova
Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights Liudmyla Denisova says that women and children are forcibly taken from the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions to Russia.
"From the territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions temporarily occupied by the enemy, women and children are forcibly taken out to the territory of Russia. In settlements, which include Russian troops, so-called 'humanitarian corridors' are organized for residents to be taken to the aggressor country. Women, children, elderly people are searched, Ukrainian documents, phones are taken away and sent to the border regions of Russia. There they are placed in concentration camps with subsequent transfer to the depressive regions of Russia for settlements," Denisova said in the Telegram channel.
According to her, people were left without means of communication with their relatives, often without food, basic necessities.
"Currently, there is no data on the number of deported persons. The office of the Prosecutor General is conducting a pretrial investigation into the illegal removal of 2,389 children from the occupied territories of Donbas to Russia. But the Russian press, which is prone to distorting reality in the direction of exaggerating the achievements of the invaders, notes 206,000 IDPs from Donbass," she said.
The ombudsman said that attempts by the Russian side to create similar "humanitarian borders" to the occupying country were recorded in Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Sumy and Kyiv regions.
"The fate of the people who were forcibly taken out is unknown," she said.
Denisova said such actions by the aggressor state qualify as kidnapping, which is a war crime and a direct violation of articles 3 and 34 of the Geneva Convention for the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights person.
"I appeal to the international community to take into account the terrorist activities of the troops of the aggressor state when determining the boundaries of sanctions pressure on the Russian Federation," she said.
The ombudsman also called on the citizens of Ukraine not to trust the occupiers, but to use exclusively agreed humanitarian corridors for evacuation, announced on the pages of the Ukrainian authorities.
