Invaders develop 10-year plan for ethnic cleansing in Mariupol, replacing population with Russians – ISW
Russian officials have developed a plan for a ten-year campaign of ethnic cleansing in the occupied Mariupol, Donetsk region, according to a report by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) for August 20.
“Ukrainian partisans gained access to a Russian occupation development document that stipulates a 300,000 increase in Mariupol’s overall population by 2035 through migration from Russia. The Resistance Center reported that an existing preferential mortgage program for Russians who move to occupied Mariupol is a part of this resettlement effort. Russian occupation officials have engaged in a series of efforts to attract Russian citizens to the occupied territories in Ukraine,” the message says.
According to analysts, the population of Mariupol before the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation was more than 400,000 people, and as of May 2023, about 120,000 residents remained in the occupied city.
“The Russian siege of Mariupol during the first phases of the Russian full-scale invasion killed up to 25,000 Ukrainian civilians and displaced hundreds of thousands from the city. Russian officials reportedly deported an additional 50,000 residents from the city to Russia and other occupied territories in the months following its capture,” the ISW says.
Analysts note that the goals of the aforementioned document indicate that the Russian Federation intends to turn Mariupol into a predominantly ethnic Russian city after systematic and probably deliberate efforts to reduce the number of ethnic Ukrainians in the city.
“ISW continues to assess that the ongoing Russian efforts to deport Ukrainians and repopulate Ukrainian cities with imported Russian citizens likely amount to a deliberate ethnic cleansing campaign in addition to being apparent violations of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide,” the report reads.
It is also reported that the Russian authorities continue to forcibly take mothers and children from the occupied territories of Ukraine to the Russian Federation under the guise of medical measures.
