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In Ukraine, a new school year has begun under the conditions of martial law. Only schools with shelter that meets the safety requirements of the SNS accepted students this year.
First Lady of Ukraine Elena Zelenska during an online speech at the event “Shaping the Future of Education Now”, held on the sidelines of the United Nations Summit of the Future, noted that “in Ukraine, the undisputed right of children to education must be physically protected from Russian aggression.”
“Therefore, today we are probably the country with the greatest development of online learning in the world,” the first lady quotes the site Office of the President of Ukraine.
Site https://saveschools.in.ua, which is a resource of the Ministry of Education, documents and provides real-time statistics of destroyed educational institutions. According to their data, as of now 3,798 educational institutions have been damaged by bombings and shelling, of which 365 have been completely destroyed.
Russia justifies attacks on educational institutions on the territory of Ukraine allegedly by the deployment of Ukrainian troops in them. Propagandists actively use mirroring tactics to hide the crimes of their own army.
Russian media “Military Enchantment”back in 2022, published an article about the behavior of the Ukrainian army, reflecting its own crimes in Ukraine:
“Ukrainian military, whose behavior in this case is not much different from the behavior of representatives of terrorist groups, try to cover themselves in schools, kindergartens, hospitals to carry out military activities. At the same time, pictures of “Russian troops hitting civilian objects” are coming to the West. The fact that these facilities are turned into military by the troops of the Kiev regime themselves, of course, are silent.”
Here are some typical examples of how hostile propaganda works.
Lenta in an article for November 13, 2022 about the attack on Nikolaev:
“The barracks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, built in one of the schools in Nikolaev, were hit by the Russian strike on November 1, along with the personnel. About this “RIA Novosti” was told by an activist of the Nikolaev underground”.
“According to him,“The military complains about the attacks on the gymnasium building.” We are talking about the First Ukrainian Gymnasium named after Mykola Arkas. The activist also said that in 2014 in this school “compote called “Blood of Russian Babies” was sold in the canteen,” the propaganda media writes.
Tsargrad/Tsargrad Edition:
“In Ukraine, they invented a cunning plan to cover the positions of the Ukrainian military. They will be placed in educational institutions of Zaporizhia, including kindergartens. During this period, classes in schools and preschool educational institutions will resume. This also applies to additional education. About this information agency “RIA Novosti” was informed by an employee of the law enforcement agencies with reference to a source in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
“Gazeta” with reference to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation writes about the placement of weapons by the Ukrainian military in the schools of Slavyansk, Pokrovsk and Dnipro.
“According to him, in one of the schools of the Donetsk city of Pokrovsk, Ukrainian troops built a stronghold, on the upper floor they placed sniper positions and large-caliber machine guns, in the courtyard - heavy equipment and RSHVs. At the same time, in the gymnasium of the educational institution “under the pretext of ensuring security,” they keep residents of neighboring houses.
The Russian publication “Politicus” reports on the use of bombs on the Ukrainian university:
“A bomb flew over the barracks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the border Sumy in the evening. The barracks were located in the building of the local university, which was taken away by the military. As a result of the explosion, the building is partially destroyed.”
Lenta about the air bomb attack on Kharkov:
“Earlier it became known that the Russian military struck militants of the Ukrainian National Battalion “Azov” (recognized as a terrorist organization and banned in Russia), who were hiding in one of the schools in Kharkiv. The attack was carried out early in the morning on Thursday, September 19.”
Frontline and border regions suffered the greatest destruction of educational institutions. In the first months of the war, the Russians actively attacked the state border of Ukraine from the east, Crimea and the north with the support of aviation.
The cities were subjected to aerial bombardments in the middle of the day.
Testimonies of war crimes of the Russian army against educational institutions in Ukraine were imprinted in the photographs of Ukrainian photojournalists.
For the strategically important city of Vasylkiv in the Kiev region, the Russians tried to seize the airfield, blew up the oil base, the city was under constant shelling. On February 27, 2022, a Russian rocket destroyed the Vasilkov Vocational Lyceum.
The siege of Chernihiv and partial occupation of the region lasted for more than a month. There were frequent air raids low over the city.
Podusovka microdistrict is one of the most affected in Chernihiv. Here, the Russian army bombed two schools at once, dropping bombs from the plane.
For informationTEXTS(in conjunction with the newspaper “Vost” (Chernihiv)), school No. 18 housed the city's terroboron, that is, local residents who were preparing to defend their city from the invading army, as well as doctors, teachers, cooks. The exact number of dead is unknown. In school No. 21, there were children with their parents who miraculously survived.
The village of Makariv, Buchansky district, in the Kiev region, is among those settlements that were affected by the atrocities of the Russians. For a short time, the invaders managed to take part of the village, they shelled residential neighborhoods and civilian infrastructure.
On July 8, 2024, as a result of a missile strike on the children's hospital “Okhmatdyt”, the classroom and library of the educational center “School of Superheroes”, located on the territory of the hospital, were destroyed. It taught children who were being treated in a hospital.
In Ukraine, education is literally bombed because of the war. But there is something that cannot be counted, restored, returned — it is a lost human resource, lost opportunities, lost time when children cannot learn.
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The Russian army is not only destroying Ukrainian schools, it is also turning them into torture. They were found in school buildings in the de-occupied territories.
According to the message Chernihiv District State AdministrationIn the village of Yahydne, 15 km from Chernihiv, in the bare concrete rooms of the school basement, the Russian military held nearly 370 locals hostage. Among them are 70 children. With little food and water, in the dark, with shared toilet buckets, they slept one by one in small crowded rooms. 10 older people died of suffocation and due to lack of medication.
After the de-occupation of the region, foreign journalists visited the village and talked with its inhabitants.
British edition The Telegraphin an article for April 16, 2022 writes: “Peasants who were held hostage in the basement for a month counted the days before they were freed”. The publication tells how almost 400 people a month were forced to live, breathe and go to the toilet in the basement for weeks.
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“But it is the walls of the roomsat the Yagodnya Secondary School, they tell a terrible story of the terror suffered by residents of the village of Yagydne near Chernihiv, - continues The Telegraph. - Their “farewell gift”“(before the Russian army left the village — ed.) it was necessary to block the peasants in the basement by attaching a concrete slab to the door.”
According to the agency Reutersthe Kremlin did not respond to a request about the events in Yagodny. “Russia denies the allegationsin extrajudicial killings, torture and mistreatment of civilians. The Kremlin said its troops were not targeting civilians and accused the Ukrainian authorities and the West of falsifying evidence,” Reuters reported.
At the same time, the Russian army itself uses schools in the occupied territories to deploy personnel and place weapons. After the de-occupation of the territories, traces of Russians' stay in educational institutions were discovered and documented, including inscriptions and drawings, which may also serve as evidence of crimes committed by Russians against Ukrainian education and culture in international courts.
In addition to physically destroying Ukrainian schools, Russia destroys the educational system in the occupied territories, closing Ukrainian schools, destroying libraries, burning Ukrainian books.
Institute of Mass Informationspent study“How Russia Destroys School Education in the Occupied Territories of Ukraine.” The investigation revealed four schemes under which Russia “denacifies” education in Ukraine: recruiting teachers, engaging in “retraining” and “upskilling” collaborators, sending “humanitarian missions” and terrorizing Ukrainian educators.
Russia constantly promotes the narrative that the Ukrainian authorities are not able to take care of the safety of children. The propaganda tells how “children of Donbas” and other temporarily occupied territories go to school, feeling safe. While children in Ukraine sit in bomb shelters.
Russian propaganda claims that it is the Russian authorities who are evacuating Ukrainian children from shelling in order to save. However, it is silent who is shelling the territory of Ukraine and is an invader in this war. This justifies the deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia.
“Southern News Service”:
“Each time, the representative of the Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova and the deputy representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations Dmitry Polyansky should provide indisputable facts that the evacuation of Ukrainian residents, including their children, is a forced measure. Unlike the Kiev regime, where it is convenient for old people, women and children to remain hostages as a living shield during hostilities (Mariupol, Lysychansk, Severodonetsk are examples), Russia is currently trying to save these lives.
Another reason invented by Russia for the deportation of Ukrainian children is rehabilitation in children's camps, after which the Russian authorities refuse to return the children.
“The children who were able to returnand unite with relatives, they testify to total Russification,” she said in an interview “Media Detector”Adviser to the President of Ukraine on Children's Rights and Child Rehabilitation Daria Gerasimchuk.
Associated Pressin the article “How Moscow is grabbing Ukrainian children and turning them into Russians”writes about the abduction of Ukrainian children by Moscow.
We are talking about children who were found in the basements of war-torn cities, children in which their parents died, and children from orphanages. According to the publication with reference to the government of Ukraine, most children from orphanages are not orphans — their parents were in difficult living conditions.
The publication conducted its own large-scale investigation, which is confirmed by dozens of interviews with parents, children and officials in Ukraine and Russia; emails; publications in the media. This investigation “extends” to children already living in Russia.
The author notes that the Russian authorities have done everything to simplify the adoption of Ukrainian children and encourage it.
“AP has discoveredthat officials deported Ukrainian children to Russia or Russian-controlled territories without consent, lied to them that their parents did not want them, used them for propaganda, took them into Russian families and granted citizenship,” the newspaper said.
The article contains the story of Maria Lvova-Belova, the Russian children's ombudsman, that a group of 30 children evacuated to Russia from the basements of Mariupol first sang the anthem of Ukraine and shouted “Glory to Ukraine!” But after a while they fell in love with Russia, and she herself adopted a Ukrainian teenager.
“No matter if they have parents or not,Raising children of war in another country or culture may be a sign of genocide, an attempt to erase the very identity of an enemy nation,” the British newspaper said.
Deportation and illegal adoption are not all crimes of Russians against Ukrainian children.
How notifies Institute of Mass InformationRussians also commit sexual violence and torture. Children are sent to camps for “political re-education”, Russified and militarized, forced to work, and used in numerous propaganda videos and actions.
According to PACE resolutionand Conclusion of the OSCE Expert Missionthe deportation of children from Ukraine is recognized as a war crime and an element of genocide.
On March 17, 2023, the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued an arrest warrant for the President of the Russian Federation Putin and Commissioner for the Rights of the Child Maria Lvova-Belova under the President of the Russian Federation.
The material was worked on:
Researcher of the topic, author of the text: Yana Yevmenova
Bildeditor: Vyacheslav Ratynskyi
Literary Editor: Julia Futei
Site Manager: Vladislav Kuhar
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