RCHR and the Lemkin Institute for the Prevention of Genocide (USA) filed Submission to the International Criminal Court regarding unreasonable delay in repatriation of Ukrainian children.

Since the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has managed to return only 386 children, although the number of Ukrainian minors deported and forcibly transferred to Russia exceeds 19500 persons. Russia systematically resists the come-back of Ukrainian children through setting unrealistic conditions and establishing procedural obstacles.

Regional Center for Human Rights considers the delay in repatriation to be a systemic policy of Russian officials aimed at retaining Ukrainian children on the territory controlled by the Russian Federation forever. The unreasonable delay in repatriation may be qualified as both a war crime and a crime against humanity. A special intent of the Russian leadership to commit the crime of genocide in the form of the forcible transfer of Ukrainian children to the Russian national group may be equally distinguished in this regard.

RCHR and the Lemkin Institute for the Prevention of Genocide request that the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court:

• continue investigating the situation related to illegal deportations, forcible transfers, and delays in the repatriation of Ukrainian children;
• call on the Pre-Trial Chamber II to amend the arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova through the inclusion of unreasonable delay in repatriation of Ukrainian children as a separate crime;
• call on the the Pre-Trial Chamber II to issue arrest warrants for the officials of the occupied territories for their involvement in war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of genocide.

Regional Center for Human Rights and the Lemkin Institute are hopeful of the prompt results of the consideration of the Submission in the forseeable future.

We express our gratitude to Save Ukraine for its assistance in the preparation of the Submission!

The full text of the Submission:

This publication was compiled with the support of the European Union and the International Renaissance Foundation within the framework «European Renaissance of Ukraine» project. Its content is the exclusive responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union and the International Renaissance Foundation.