Transcripts For ESPRESO 20240704

They want this . Eh, this is a question that needs to be clarified, because if they testify on camera in russia that they do not want to return, or immediately after returning, due to the fact that they were traumatized and re traumatized, even during repatriation will say that something is wrong here, this does not mean that they really think so and that this is their position, that is, children should undergo psychological rehabilitation, children should have a special. Integration program and obviously a support program, we are not talking about the fact that each of them needs to give out , as russia does, apartments, cars and pay huge sums of money, because it will at least be unfair to other children who have suffered from the armed conflict, but we do not want to buy these children, like the Russian Federation after all wants, we want these children to remain ukrainian citizens, to have this ukrainian identity, which in reality you can never buy, that is, the russian strategy. Hope, as long as they have money, when the money runs out, the kids will pack their bags and go back , because what we see and what we observe, at least for a group of teenage kids, is not that simple and not that effective, its even russian manipulation strategies that have been tested for many years, probably from the soviet union, and that is why, for example, now maria lvova bilova has started such a new the initiative from february 2024, when not only. Children, but also members of their families are now going to the reeducation camps, that is , it is probably calculated, at first people loyal to the russians will go there for such a show, but then they will be forced there dragging those who do not want to obey president putin and forcefully reeducating them has a doubleedged effect by reeducating children, they want to influence disloyal families, and by looking for some loyal members in this family, they try to eradicate the childrens identity. Because on unfortunately, sometimes we record such cases when the child does not want to go to russia, when the child does not want a russian passport, and he is just waiting to escape from the occupied territory, for example, or from the territory of the Russian Federation, and then connect here with one of his relatives, but i am one of the parents, or, for example, a grandmother or an aunt who, receiving certain benefits from russia for raising this child, oppose it, i would like to emphasize here that this should not in any way deprive this child. The right to preserve ones identity and return to the territory of vreshchireshch statecontrolled citizenship, and if such persons resist this, they will be accomplices of russian crimes, and therefore one should think twice before sending ones child to reeducation camps or to russian schools, if such a choice still remains. Actually , russian propaganda claims that the ukrainian children who were returned. To the unoccupied part of ukraine, that they allegedly want to return to russia, and isnt this a warning sign that russia may refuse to return them at all . Er, i want to explain this situation because they they simply cut out a part of the ukrainian airwaves, it was disturbed there and they talk about the fact that they are ukrainian, even human rights activists claim that the Russian Federation takes better care of ukrainian children than ukraine. This is a delusion, the cases when someone returned to the territory of the Russian Federation from ukraine, they are single, that is, among 388 children, maybe there is someone there alone, and if we look at his personal history, we will see that there are relatives in the territory of the Russian Federation, that maybe there were some objective ones the reasons why the child went there, maybe she did not return there to her permanent place of residence, therefore, firstly, this requires additional clarifications, and secondly, the fact that the russian. The federation for some reason took it into its head, that ukraine does not take good care of returned children is also not true. We see that now, in connection with the significant attention of the International Community to the crime of deportation, as well as in connection with the fact that new and new initiatives are being created for the return of ukrainian children, their rehabilitation, these children are returned quite feel good, we still need to meet their individual needs, in particular, in terms of bridging the educational gap, in terms of psychological rehabilitation, again i mentioned reintegration, but these children are not begging, these children are in family forms of education or study in in our educational institutions, that is, it is allowed by ukrainian legislation and are under other forms of guardianship. These children have certain payments, these children have the constant support of such a social worker from the state, that is, not everything is as bad as the Russian Federation here wants to pretend to be, and i only emphasize that now, not governmental organizations, that the state is trying to improve the situation of all children affected by the armed conflict, and therefore there will be special programs support, and there will be a special psychological program. These, but we must understand that, unfortunately, these are things that require a certain amount of time to prepare, you cannot organize it in one day. The Russian Federation has been preparing for the deportation of ukrainian children for years. Mrs katerina, i know that you often visit abroad and communicate with our International Partners. In particular, last year in november, you communicated with un delegations and, if im not mistaken, conveyed to them. The concept of a single mechanism for the return of small ukrainians. Actually, to begin with, tell us what this concept is, and then i would like to know your observations and your conclusions about how determined and ready our International Partners are to help return children, or is this just another set of concerns . The team of the Regional Center of human rights at the beginning of. 2023 conducted such a global enough study, we studied the experience of those countries that faced deportation, abduction of their children, experience related to identification, related to return, rehabilitation and reintegration, we also analyzed existing International Standards and international treaties, in order to adapt them to the ukrainian context, but again, on the other hand, not to invent a bicycle, some such mechanism that no one has ever heard of and is unlikely to agree to. And in as a result, we came to such an obvious scheme, perhaps for some, it is quite similar to the one that existed in the grain agreement, when ukraine and the Russian Federation, because the children are under its control, and we, unfortunately, without the complete surrender of the Russian Federation , without it we will not be able to return the children now, therefore ukraine and the Russian Federation must come to an agreement, but this must be done exclusively through a third party, which will not just be an intermediary there, some kind of list will be handed over, like. To play the role of the guarantor of the return process, which will also agree on the simplification of the return process and on reducing its duration, on the unification of the documents required by the Russian Federation, and also accurately predict the categories of children that ukraine will return to ukraine, that the Russian Federation is forced to return, i. E. For this third party has a lot of functions and roles, and so, going back to the question, or . All these initiatives are not just declarations, we have to understand that canada, the United States america, norway, they returned ukrainian children without joy already today, all 1900 of them, but the Russian Federation will never agree to their mediation, so we are looking for someone for ourselves, to whom the Russian Federation will agree, currently it is qatar, there are still occasional rumors about participation of some vatican, but again, the ukrainian side. It does not confirm this, although the russian side there issued a whole report on the role of the vatican. There are also some initiatives from the global south, in particular the republic of south africa, which i also visited, interested, and it was announced by the president , to join the process, effectively join the process of returning ukrainian children. And here we have to understand that this has already ceased to be exclusively ukraines pain, exclusively ukraines problem, and it probably has to be solved already. Not only for ukraine, now we have to take a leading role and develop a return mechanism, exactly the one that is contained in our concept, is it possible that something is improved there, more, i dont know, it is so refined, you know, but that this the mechanism also worked for other children who are currently suffering in armed conflicts, then the probability of returning ukrainian children also increases, the probability of supporting such a mechanism also increases and. Such an important thing, which i want to emphasize, is that it is impossible to combine return and return in one mechanism , and bringing the guilty persons to justice, this. Means that we have to forgive putin and lviv bilov for the deportations and say that we did not see it, it is very good that the children were returned, but this means that in the matter the priority is return, and that in the potential written agreement on the mechanism of return, there may not be a provision on the responsibility of the Russian Federation, but again, this does not exclude such responsibility and the International Criminal court will definitely not cancel the arrest warrants after the return of the ukrainian children. As a matter of fact , with regard to this warrant, almost a year has passed since it was issued, what has changed in this case during this year, and has the list of suspects been added, unfortunately, in this case, in this episodes, deportation and forced transfer of ukrainian children, we have had no changes since march 17, 2023, when arrest warrants were issued, that is, there are no new suspects, just as there are no additional qualifications. Additions to current arrest warrants, but their existence is still an unprecedented, megasymbolic event. For the first time, in the history of the existence of International Criminal law as such, not even only the International Criminal court, an arrest warrant is obtained by the current head of a Nuclear State during the current, rather heated armed conflict, that is, it was a great victory and could not but have an impact. Opinions were divided, including in the ukrainian expert panel. Above, as well as the Russian Federation, it is evident that the issuance of arrest warrants only directly complicated the process of return, but here , in order to be as objective as possible, i would rely on statistics before the issuance of arrest warrants, lvova bilova published, and we will operate with their data, because they are the same, i will explain what these data are, but lets start with them. So, before the arrest warrants were issued, she contributed to the return of five ukrainian children. After issuing. Arrest warrants, the number of such children, in her opinion, where she contributed to the return, she and moskalkova 94, it is tangible, so until march 17, 2023 , a year also passed, and for this year only five children, where they contributed there, here a year has passed and it is already 94, i. E. The numbers are different, but we at the regional human rights center, together with our partners, from the lenkiv institute for the prevention of the crime of genocide, have come to the conclusion that even those. In the cases where they say, we facilitated, we facilitated something there, we have witnesses, that is , victims of the abuses of the Russian Federation, who say, no, it only interfered with us, that is, the russians put forward new and new conditions, the requirement to pass dna tests, the requirement to pass a polygraph test, numerous longterm interrogations with the federal Security Service with other russian Law Enforcement officers, some kind of compulsion to undress and then be burned to speak there, make the Russian Federation exclusively for the sole purpose of later using this recording against these people and manipulating them, that is, even in these cases, the Russian Federation did not contribute, but the return process intensified, and we see a change in the narrative during 2022, maria lvova aloova told everywhere that president putin said there to eliminate red tape in the legislation, to grant russian citizenship to everyone, to hand over ukrainian children even with ukrainian citizenship in russian families, well, there was such a thing, you cant get the words out of the song. This is their conversation on march 9, 2022, already in the conversation on february 16, it was on the eve of the issuance of arrest warrants, there she talked a little bit about the transfer of ukrainian children to their families, about the fact that she took the child herself, but it was already clear that they suspected something, because the International Community had already begun to prepare, they knew that we were gathering evidence, they were returning the first children are on their own, and already on march 17 there was a great calm, they were there preparing that they would comment. On march 17, march 17, 2023, the moment the arrest warrants were issued, they lingered there, lingered, then began to come out with a statement, maria lvovabilova, these are her words that president putin gave an order to facilitate the reunification of families, they dont say it, they dont use the word return anywhere, because if they say return, it turns out that they were relocated, it turns out that they were kidnapped, it turns out that they were deported, they say reunification, as if neutralizing, some kind of. Uh, they chose one of the words and in fact they manipulate this word reunification somewhat, because you can reunite biological families, but as for orphans, especially if they have lost a legal guardian, here will be much more difficult, and they understand it and they dont want to return such children, but less so, if we summarize this whole long excursion, i will not abuse, the situation has moved from a dead point, and now we are already talking about some. International initiatives, we are accumulating the support of the International Community and we are planning, we are not just dreaming, we are planning to return thousands of ukrainian children in 2024, and i think that this is abahome. The merit of arrest warrants . Ms. Kateryna, on march 13 this year , the European Parliament held a debate on the creation of a Legal Mechanism for the return of small ukrainians to their homeland. How can the European Parliament influence this at all . I would say that this is a logical process, a continuation, or even a supplement, of what is happening at the level of the council of europe on january 25. A resolution was adopted in 2016, which also emphasized the need to create a single, transparent, understandable, Legal Mechanism for the identification and return of ukrainian children. Yes, indeed, the European Union cannot be that third party, because the Russian Federation will not agree to it, and they cannot somehow physically go there, return the children, but it is only one aspect of a larger mechanism. Others are the identification of children, and here the European Union with its. Capabilities, including in terms of software, intelligence, they can help us. Next is the question of rehabilitation and reintegration, here they can help both with expertise and financially, and with the organization of certain processes for ukrainian children. I would like to emphasize that a significant prerequisite for the return of deported ukrainian children is simply a must have, without it it will not happen, it is the reform of deinstitutionalization, that is, as long as we will not. There will be a register of adoptive parents until we have a queue, and it is already forming, because you know here, so that there is no cutoff later, a queue of adoptive parents is already forming, and there are those people who are ready to take deported ukrainian orphans and children deprived of parental care and it will happen, but we need a big and important reform so that not a single child stays in these soviet type barracks, i wont even call it an orphanage, because 200400. People in one territory, thats more like a colony of strict regime, and not for a childrens institution, we have to get rid of this, and this is supported by the leadership of our state, and this is a mandatory condition, by the way, for our european integration, so all these processes take place in parallel, and the European Union can definitely help in certain of them , in others it can support ukraine, and after all, the European Union has a huge system of treaties with the states of the global south, they quite. Successfully used this system of treaties, Foreign Trade agreements, preferential agreements, in order to avoid unrest within the states of the global cock, now they can somehow try to use trade and economic mechanisms there so that these states at least join the coalition for the return of ukrainian children, and it would be desirable if one of them, either collectively or individually, acted as a mediator on this side in relations with by the Russian Federation, by the way. Regarding intermediaries, speaking of countries that can be guarantors, it may be worth considering countries that can have some influence on russia, in particular, for example, china, or wasnt the question of joining this country discussed . Uh, thats a very good question and i m sure it was discussed, although i dont have such information, because its as logical as possible, that is, i think that our state. Started with two candidacies, this is turkey, which was already the third the party, quite successful, which is currently promoting the return of ukrainian prisoners of war, and probably china. I will not comment on the political and diplomatic position of china, because i think that my opinion is not mainstream, you know, i do not want to expose myself to criticism, but i am sure that china will not be a third party, and therefore we need to look for someone else. But you are absolutely right, it must be a state that is in. Relations with the Russian Federation, well, not that it is on an equal footing, and not that it is already on top, because china refused, but at least to be able to somehow influence the Russian Federation and for the return of a significant number of children, because you know, when they tell me that the return of 11 children is the largest group, this is a great victory, i am happy, because every child is important, who crosses the Ukrainian Border in the direction of ukraine, but 11 children is very little, at such rates we do not have. A chance to bring everyone back within even one decade, so we need countries that can potentially be further considered and what is currently being worked out, for example, saudi arabia is a pretty good candidate, russia has certain interests in this state and in cooperation with this state, it could be brazil, and by the way, brazil also has such a rather ambiguous position towards a fullscale russian invasion, so in principle it could be such for the Russian Federation candidate. For negotiations, and at the same time we mention brics, at the same time we mention that brazil is a catholic great power, and we heard about the role of the vatican in the return of civilians, so to speak. The stars are converging, it could be kazakhstan, because now it is not a wellknown thing, but kazakhstan is a recognized country, at least by the un, by unicef, which has excellent practices in the identification of kidnapped children in the context of idols in the context of the abduction of children who were in different camps that kazakhstan then repatriated them from syria and from iraq, this is a cool state, as far as the rehabilitation and reintegration of such children is concerned, and kazakhstan. Has certain relations with the Russian Federation as well, and in fact i already mentioned the republic of south africa, which is also a member of brics, although we remember that putin did not go to the summit in this country due to an arrest warrant, did not risk it, although you know that does not mean that he did not go anywhere, and during the 23rd year after the issuance of arrest warrants, he still traveled and traveled to that country, by the way, which you and i remember today as possible. Advocates, that is, here there is a certain potential of the states that i named, to dream that it will be one of our satellite states, our partners, or from states with a recognized reputation in the field of protecting childrens rights, such as such a country is canada, unfortunately, it does not have to be, because the Russian Federation will simply, simply stand in a position. Ms. Kateryna, in the end, i would like to ask you about the number of children who were successfully returned, and whether. You know whether there are plans for the return of ukrainian children in the near future, perhaps little children . So, as of today, according to official information, 388 children have been returned, you could have heard a higher figure, it could have been a figure of more than 500 children, it is also mentioned, but this is together with those children who were reunited with their relatives because they were separated in in connection with the russian aggression, these children mostly returned from the occupied territories, but this. Returned, deported and forcibly displaced children is exactly 388, and it is, unfortunately, very small. Ukraine is planning and preparing, because i dont like the word planning, you know. You can plan all you want, but preparing is already about something specific, returning more children, and we are talking about hundreds of children, we are talking about thousands of children, because no matter how we talk about the number, which one to believe or not to believe, but we had registers of status children, children and children deprived of parental care. And are and continue to be at our disposal, that is why we well understand who was deported from the kherson childrens home, who was deported from oleshok, who was deported from the border areas to the socalled dpr and lpr, of the newly occupied territories of ukraine, this is all well known, not secret information for ukraine, so we have a list of children with whom we can work and who can be returned, there are many preparatory tasks, again i mention this reform of deinstitutionalization, because if the children are status children, they can only be returned to their families and to. The country creates all such grounds in order to return these children, so i would not make a big romance here and tell you that everything is really, really good here , and we will bring back all 1,900 children tomorrow, no, directly tomorrow, in order to return everyone, it will be such a difficult situation and a very big challenge, whether ukraine will cope with it, ukraine will cope with it, but whether it is being talked about and whether there are any plans for such a thing, no. No , now, unfortunately, the mechanism remains as it was , that is, if through qatar, then we transfer a certain list, er, and together with all accompanying documents, from parents, from guardians, the Russian Federation sits there one, two three months, even they themselves talk about it, considering this list, i dont know what she does it there, she reads it word by word, i really honestly do not understand that it is possible to check the documents for a maximum of 11 children for so long, and even then. The process of physical return is taking place, the mechanism will work like this for now, a single Legal Mechanism has not yet been created, but i am convinced that more children will return in 2024. Well, let s hope for that, mrs. Kateryna, i thank you very much for an incredible professional conversation, kateryna rashevska, a lawyer of the Regional Center for human rights, was a guest with us. And the audience stay with us what is bahmud . 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We have already come to the snake itself. The following shots of you. Can shock news from the scene live, kamikaze drone attacks, political analytics, objective and meaningful, there is no political season, exclusive interviews, reports from the hottest points of the front, freedom life, frankly and impartially, you draw your own conclusions. Vasyl zimas big broadcast. This is the great aether, my name is vasyl zemaye, we are starting two hours of airtime, two hours of your time, we will discuss many important topics today, two hours to learn about the war, right now we will talk more about the war, serhii zgurets is with us, and how is he living world, now about what happened in the world , yuriy fizar will talk in more detail, yuriy , good evening, please, you have the floor, two hours to keep up with economic news, time to talk about money during the war, oleksandr morchivka is with us, oleksandr, welcome, please, and sports news, a review of Sports Events from yevhen pastukhov, as well as distinguished guests of the studio, andriy parubiy, peoples deputy of ukraine, who was also the chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of ukraine. Events of the day in two hours, vasyl zimas big broadcast, a project for smart and caring people. Espresso in the evening. Greetings to all espresso viewers, its time to catch up on the latest news. Events of this hour and i will start with the following the russians launched a missile attack on the konotop in sumy oblast. Damaged infrastructure in one of the microdistricts of the city there is no heat and hot water, said the mayor of the city, arten semenikhin. Relevant services eliminate the consequences. According to preliminary data, there are no casualties or injuries. 285 citizens, including 26 children, were evacuated from border settlements