“Russification”: Russia’s Mission to Steal Ukraine’s Youth

Alexa Fishman

Introduction

Russia’s four-year-long war against Ukraine has dominated headlines since February 2022. Members of the international community have watched as hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed, injured, and displaced in this conflict. Powers like the United States have sent aid to Ukraine in order to prevent Russia from reabsorbing the country. However, one aspect of this war has been underrepresented in the news, lost in a sea of casualty reports and territory updates—Russia’s mission to “Russify” Ukrainian children through a coordinated campaign of abduction, indoctrination, and adoption. 

Background

This indoctrination campaign first began not in Russia’s most recent war against Ukraine, but rather during its 2014 invasion and occupation of Crimea. After Russia annexed the peninsula, it established camp-like facilities and boarding schools in the region to which they transferred Ukrainian children from Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts—then-controlled by Russian-backed separatists—for reeducation programs. The purpose of these programs was “Russification,” the systemic erasure of the children’s Ukrainian identity and incorporation into Russian society as part of a larger effort to integrate Ukraine into the Russian Federation. The 2014 effort was conducted at a generally small scale, and most of the children were found and returned to their homes. However, this is not the case today. 

After Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 and illegally annexed Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhia oblasts seven months later, they rapidly expanded their Russification efforts and have shown no sign of stopping. Targeting vulnerable groups of children such as those from low-income families, those with disabilities, and orphans, the Russian military and affiliated groups have abducted thousands of children from occupied Ukrainian regions, most frequently Donetsk and Luhansk. They have carried out the abductions in a variety of ways, ranging from tricking parents with the promise of summer camp for their children to kidnapping children from orphanages. Ukrainian authorities have confirmed 19,456 cases of abduction, while an extensive study by Yale University estimated the true number to be over 35,000 children ranging from four months to 17 years old. Russian authorities often operate the abductions under the ruse of protecting the children from the dangers of war; victim reports document Russian soldiers telling the children they are simply transporting them away from areas of fighting. 

After abduction, the children are brought to a variety of locations in Russia, Belarus, and Russian-occupied territories, including military bases, medical facilities, secondary schools and universities, hotels, orphanages, religious sites, and most frequently, sanatoriums. At the majority of sites, “re-education” has occurred, in which the children are forced to undergo pro-Russia cultural, patriotic, and historical programming. At certain sites, children have also been trained militarily with exercises such as drone assembly, combat drills, and education in military history. The final step is then coerced fostering and adoption; the children are either placed directly with a Russian citizen to be fostered and eventually adopted, or listed on Russian placement databases. Due to new and amended legislation introduced after the invasion, Russian authorities can act as proxies for those children to apply for then-quickly granted Russian citizenship and the renunciation of their Ukrainian citizenship upon their arrival to Russian territories, allowing them to be naturalized into the country. The result is a simplified, forceful incorporation of new citizens into the growing Russian empire. 

Experiences and Impact 

The abducted youth have faced a wide range of abuses. The few children who have been rescued from facilities report physical punishment used by teachers for unknown reasons, a lack of adequate food and healthcare, prevention of contact between the children and their parents by authorities, and psychological manipulation. Once adopted by Russian families—some of whom are not informed the children are actually Ukrainian—kids continue to be integrated into Russian society and, if kidnapped at a young enough age, begin to forget their true identity. This is the Russification that is the Russian government’s ultimate goal—stealing children who should have grown up Ukrainian.

The kidnapped children are not the only group affected; the morale of both Ukrainian parents and the population at large are negatively impacted by the Russification program. When these children are abducted, parents are usually kept in the dark by authorities; one mother from Kherson reported not knowing where her daughter had been taken and camp staff refusing to answer her phone calls, as well as watching other parents who went to Crimea to find their children never return. The abduction program is also not helping already low morale among civilians; Ukrainians are exhausted from four years of war, and despite their ongoing resilience, many do not see a future for themselves in Ukraine. In his address to the United Nations General Assembly in 2023, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy even declared that “this is clearly a genocide,” underscoring the very real harm that the Russification program is inflicting on the Ukrainian people.

Intervention Efforts

While not receiving as much attention as other aspects of the war, Russia’s abductions have drawn a fair amount of international condemnation. In March 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Russian Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights Maria Lvova-Belova on allegations of war crimes related to the deportations from Ukraine to Russia, with the European Union voicing their outrage shortly after in April the same year. The United States expressed its disapproval through a congressional resolution in March 2024, and a bipartisan cohort of senators introduced a resolution in May 2025 calling for the return of the abducted children as a condition of a peace agreement ending the war. The United Nations, passing a resolution in December 2025, also demanded the return of the children and for Russia to cease every aspect of their Russification program. 

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian government itself as well as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have initiated efforts to rescue the stolen children. The most prominent NGO in the fight against the Russification campaign is Save Ukraine, which was established in 2014 and has helped return 1,131 children as of February 2025. They also operate centers that provide physical and mental recovery services for affected children and their families. The government program Bring Kids Back UA is an effort that unites the Ukrainian government with independent organizations such as Save Ukraine as well as other countries in order to repatriate, reintegrate, and advocate for the children. The International Coalition for the Return of Ukrainian Children, an initiative championed by Save Ukraine, was created in February 2024 to coordinate the efforts of over 40 countries.

Conclusion

The fight to rescue the stolen children is far from over. While Russia has ignored accusations of the illegality of their actions and is continuing the abductions, Ukraine also is ill prepared to receive an influx of traumatized youth if they were to recover them all. The country continues to be battered by Russian airstrikes, and the regions the children were stolen from are mostly still under Russian control. Ukrainian infrastructure is already straining from the load of four years of war, and providing vast resources for tens of thousands of youth—some of whom without families to return to—is likely too heavy for them to bear. If all the stolen children are to be returned to their homes, and if Russia is to stop the abductions, the international community will need to step in and provide much more support than they already have.