Russia took about 150,000 children out of Ukraine - Ombudsman

This was reported by the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights Dmytro Lubinets, Ukrinform reports.

Officially verified children on the territory of the Russian Federation as of yesterday remain 16 thousand 207. We are talking about the children that I, as ombudsman, know about which Ukrainian city these children are from and where they are approximately on the territory of the Russian Federation. In fact, this number of children is much higher. We assume that this number is about 150 thousand children. Russia talks about the figure of 733 thousand Ukrainian children that they keep on their territory. However, in our view, this figure is overstated, - said Lubinets.

According to him, most of the children were taken from the regions that have been or remain occupied - Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhya and Crimea. Other crimes were also recorded there.

When Kherson was liberated, I was there on the third day. Then we identified boys who were in Russian prisons. One of them is Vitaliy, 14 years old. He was tortured for 10 days in Kherson. He was severely beaten, the boy received his first meal only on the 6th day of captivity. The boy was caught with his uncle near destroyed Russian equipment and accused that they were taking pictures of this equipment. And they did not even have phones with them. But Russians did not stop this. They beat, tied and tortured," Lubinets said.

The ombudsman recalled that under international law, one of the signs of genocide is the forced transfer of children from one ethnic group to another. That is why Ukraine seeks legal recognition of the facts of taking Ukrainian children during the war as genocide.

They take Ukrainian children who communicate in the Ukrainian language, move them to Russian territory and say as if you have never been Ukrainians. They prohibit the use of the Ukrainian language, do not issue documents, do not let children out," Lubinets said.

According to him, people in the temporarily occupied territories need to find any opportunity to leave.