From the beginning of the full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war to October 2023, 2 442 children were taken to Belarus, according to the Laboratory of Humanitarian Studies at the Yale School of Public Health.
About how Ukrainian children are taken from the occupied territories to childrenʼs camps on the territory of Belarus and how pro-Soviet narratives are imposed on them, they are militarized, was written by the project "Schemes" and the Belarusian service "Radio Liberty".
In summer camps in Belarus, as the researchers note, ideas that "correspond to the political interests of Russia and Belarus" were promoted. In the "Dubrava" camp, at a concert for Ukrainian children, the Belarusian singer-propagandist "Gruzdevi Sisters" said from the stage: "Let Biden die, for Godʼs sake! Let Zelensky also die, but let Putin thrive. And [let him] took control over all of Ukraine."
The journalists established that the Belarusian branch of UNICEF (UN) and the Belarusian Red Cross contributed to the organization of the "rest" of Ukrainian children in Belarus in 2022. The Charitable Foundation of the Belarusian Paralympian and motivational speaker Oleksiy Talay is also directly related to the displacement of children.
Many children are taken to Belarus from Lysychansk and Mariupol, temporarily occupied by the Russians. This is organized centrally: teachers or the occupation authorities inform about the possibility of going somewhere. However, from the point of view of international law, even the parentsʼ consent to the trip does not legalize the removal of Ukrainian children, said Kateryna Roshevska, a lawyer at the Regional Center for Human Rights.
In August 2022, the Belarusian Red Cross and UNICEF in Belarus organized a "vacation" for Ukrainian children in the "Berozka" camp in the Grodno region. This was within the framework of the program "Humanitarian aid to refugee children from Ukraine in the summer: organization of rehabilitation and preparation for the school year."
During their stay in summer camps in Belarus, Ukrainian children are taken to symbols of pro-Soviet propaganda, events are held for them with Belarusian security forces, they are allowed to take pictures with a baton and a machine gun, and they are taken to military training grounds. Also, for children, skits are arranged with dressing up as Soviet veterans, pioneers, and border guards wounded in the head. In addition, the children are "psychologically supported" by Russian pop songs on military themes, in particular by the group "Lyube" and Iryna Allegrova.
As noted by psychologist Olha Velychko, the younger children are, the easier it is to "reflash" genetic memory, that is, it is easier for them to convey that they are not Ukrainians, but Russians or Belarusians. Orphaned children are especially vulnerable.
Journalists appealed to the representative office of the UNICEF fund in Belarus to comment on its participation in the deportation of Ukrainian children, but they remained silent. There was also a request to the headquarters of UNICEF in the USA.
Commissioner for Human Rights in Ukraine Dmytro Lubinets noted that UNICEF has already refused to participate in similar projects to take Ukrainian children to Belarus. The UN stopped funding this.
- On December 1, the International Red Cross suspended the membership of Belarus because the head of the Belarusian Red Cross Society admitted his involvement in the deportation of Ukrainian children and did not resign, as he was asked to do.
- The deportation of Ukrainian children is one of Russiaʼs war crimes, for which the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin and the Childrenʼs Ombudsman of the Russian Federation Maria Lvova-Belova. Currently, at least 19 546 Ukrainian children are known to have been forcibly deported to Russia. Ukraine also has evidence that Belarus participates in the deportation of Ukrainian children. It is not known for sure how many children are in the occupied territories of Ukraine since 2014 and 2022.