While world attention has been focussed on Russian military atrocities in Ukraine, an unseen war crime was committed in the Ukrainian territories held by Russia. For some time now Russia has been adopting Ukrainian children on a massive scale and bringing them up as Russians. Raising the children of war in another country and changing their ethnic identity is considered by many as genocide.
Investigations have specifically found that Russian officials have deported children into Russia or Russian-held territories, lied to them that they weren’t wanted by their parents and given them Russian citizenship.
Expected are other indictments, many of which are part of the Kremlin’s overt Russification program. This scheme is poorly disguised and its day-to-day application visible to all. Its effectiveness is monitored, in all likelihood, by Putin’s Chief-of-Staff, Anton Vaino, the grandson of the overseer of the Russification plan for occupied Estonia, Karl Vaino.
