Children on the front line, children under bombs, in bunkers, mutilated, traumatized, orphaned, terrified, dead. Children who “if I close my eyes do not exist”, but then jump when the missiles shake the earth, children who do not cry and no longer speak. And then there are them, the suspended children, in nobody’s world, neither dead nor alive. They are left alone in the midst of a war, lost, separated from their families, or kidnapped.
According to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry on 19 March, Russian military forces deported 2,389 children to the territory of the Russian Federation. They were in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions during the advance and would be “forcibly relocated” after being separated from their parents or after being orphaned. These “deportations – says the ministry – are kidnappings”.
Whether they are accurate numbers, in shortage or in excess, the children continue to disappear, the process of forced evacuation from the territories fallen under Russian control even if for Peskov, spokesman for the Kremlin, the “deportees from Mariupol are false propaganda”. For many besieged Ukrainians the choice, witnesses say, is between staying under the hammer of the bombings or using the corridors “offered” by the Russians to, for example, Crimea.
Since the weeks before the invasion, the authorities of the two so-called republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had announced an operation for the evacuation of the civilian population which had led to the departure of hundreds of thousands of people for Russian territory. The Ukrainian ministry does not provide details on the transfer of the children and therefore it is not possible to know if they were part of this operation, but the accusation follows that launched in recent days by the City Council of Mariupol, the city besieged by the Russians, according to which Moscow forces allegedly deported “several thousand civilians” to remote places in Russia trying to leave for safety. For their part, Russian agencies said that hundreds of Mariupol’s inhabitants would have reached Russian territory, but as refugees who were offered an escape route to safety.
Just four days ago, in a Telegram chat dedicated to missing persons Katy, a mother from Mariupol asked about her 6-year-old son: «They let us out of the bunkers and separated. I just saw him on a Russian news, there was a report on civilians “saved” from bombing, my son was on a bus with a chocolate bar in his hand, they said he was in Crimea, help me get news of him “.
Lists of missing people posted online are a pain. A list of names, dates of birth, photographs, last contacts, place of disappearance. Olena, Mariupol, last contact on 2 March; Valeriy, Donetsk, last contact March 13; Oleksandr, Mariupol, last contact March 14; Igor Bondarenko, Kharkiv, last counted on 1 March.
Endless lists, photographs, age, place of disappearance. There are young women, children, couples of children, the elderly, everyone. There is the appeal of a grandfather who is looking for his grandson Ivan Andrijovich Kolodienko, four and a half years old: “The father is a soldier, I have not had contacts for a week, please help me”. The story of Anna Yakhno, 25, is unique and common to hundreds of other mothers. Two weeks ago she lost contact with her son Sasha, 4 years old: “She was with my mother-in-law, her beloved grandmother, they were fleeing the bombing aboard a boat on the Dnipro river north of Kiev”. The boat capsized, the grandmother died, “but Sasha was wearing a life jacket and his body was not found.” Zdanovich – Yahno Alexander Alexandrovich, 4 years old, height 110 cm, brown eyes, blond hair with bangs. The ad with the photo bounces on the social chat rooms, they are looking for him in the Vyshhorod area: «They are calling me some jackals, they say they have it and they want money …» Anna says, desperate and angry. “I asked the border guards to keep an eye on the children who leave the country with the other refugees, but nothing for now. Maybe someone has welcomed him, maybe he’s hiding in some village, cut off from communications. I only hope that they have not taken it … ». The children disappear, the children are left alone. Anna, like Karina, Sofia, Polina hopes for “a miracle”.
At least 1.5 million children have become refugees and another 3.3 million children are currently displaced within the country, UNICEF said. “Each of these is a single child whose life has been torn apart, whose world has been turned upside down,” spokesman Joe English said. Unicef warns that children fleeing war are exposed, regardless of deportation, to a high risk of trafficking and exploitation. Traffickers often try to exploit the chaos of large population movements. According to a recent analysis conducted by Unicef and the Inter-Agency Coordination Group against Trafficking (Icat), 28% of the identified victims of trafficking globally are children. In the context of Ukraine, UNICEF child protection experts believe that children are likely to represent an even larger percentage of potential victims of trafficking, as children and women account for nearly all refugees who have fled the country. Country so far. On average, every day for the past 20 days in Ukraine, more than 70,000 children have become refugees, 55 every minute, almost one every second. Many travel alone: under the bombs they have lost parents and relatives. The luckiest ones hold their mother’s hand tightly, only her, because the men are in front of her. More than 500 unaccompanied children were identified as they transited from Ukraine to Romania from 24 February to 17 March. The true number of separated children who have fled Ukraine to neighboring countries is probably much higher.
To the children left alone are added the deadly consequences of the war, of the traumas, both psychological and physical. Many cannot even be treated: since 24 February 139 hospitals have been hit, 10 completely destroyed ».