Ombudsman: Children's torture chamber found in liberated Kherson
Prosecutors say that at least 443 children have been killed and more than 855 wounded since Feb. 24. But the real figures are expected to be higher since they don’t include the number of victims in Mariupol and Volnovakha, the once-besieged cities in eastern Donetsk Oblast that were heavily bombarded and are now under Russian occupation.
Moscow has also been illegally deporting Ukrainian children from occupied territories to Russia. Daria Herasymchuk, Ukraine's presidential advisor for children's rights and rehabilitation, reported on Dec. 9 that Russia has already illegally deported more than 13,000 Ukrainian children, but underscored that “this, unfortunately, is not the final figure.”
“We still have to learn about at least tens of thousands of Ukrainian children who were stolen by the Russian authorities,” she said.
Amnesty International, a human rights watchdog, said on Nov. 11 that Russia's actions of forced displacement and deportation are "reprehensible and constitute a war crime."
Russian officials have outright admitted kidnapping Ukrainian children and framed the illegal act as Moscow’s “generous” move to help them amid its war against Ukraine.