Daria Herasymchuk provides a comprehensive and sobering account of what Russia’s invasion is doing to children. Demonstrating resolve and resilience, she describes Ukraine’s efforts to ensure the safety of children at home and worldwide.
Svitlana Osipchuk: When the full-scale invasion happened in February 2022, you had been working as Commissioner for Children’s Rights and Rehabilitation in Ukraine for less than a year. What challenges did this pose for your work?
Daria Herasymchuk: On the first day of the full-scale invasion, my colleagues and I created a co-ordination centre for safeguarding children affected by the war. Within a few weeks, it became a governmental co-ordination centre approved by the Ukrainian Prime Minister. We were operating 24/7, online, from bomb shelters and from wherever we were at the time. With the onset of a full-scale war, what followed was a total violation of all the fundamental human rights that children hold. We were having to resolve — and quickly — arising problems with children’s medical services, education, evacuations, and acquiring information and references required by government agencies and NGOs. The greatest challenge did not lie in the amount of new problems but in the timeframe within which we had to react to them.
None of our colleagues left Ukraine, and so all of them needed time and help to evacuate their loved ones and to handle matters concerning their families. The people in our team making the decisions also have their own families who were at risk, and they also had lost people to this war.
I began to hate mornings. This started in those first days of the full-scale invasion. On the one hand, you wake up and feel joy, knowing that you are alive. But on the other hand, every morning I would receive reports from the national police service about the children that had been lost to Russia, who had been murdered or injured. The first thing I would do after waking up was to look at my phone. Every single day, children in Ukraine were being hurt or killed by the Russian authorities. Behind all of these numbers is a child’s life, destroyed: a child who has lost his or her health, a leg, an arm, or parents. Or a child whose life has ended, who was unable to finish writing their own life story. To this day, I still dislike mornings because of this experience.
How are you supposed to keep yourself upright, stay mobilised and ready for action, when you are being sent reports about crimes like a four-year-old girl who was repeatedly gang-raped by Russian soldiers? Or when you see photographs of children who have been killed? Trying to keep myself upright throughout this ordeal was probably the greatest challenge I have ever faced in my life.
SO: How have you managed to keep yourself on an even keel?
DH: I haven’t, I’m not there yet! I am just an ordinary person, and sometimes I feel like I haven’t any strength left. However, this is the country in which I want to live, where my child lives, and where my husband is serving — my husband has been in the military for over twenty years and is still in service — and because this is the country where I would like my child and my descendants to live, I know I cannot give up.
There was something that has been my mainstay during this time. Every year on 4 June, Ukraine marks a Day of Remembrance for children killed during the Russian–Ukrainian war. The event has been held on this date since even before the full-scale invasion. On one occasion, we went with the parents and relatives of children who have been killed in this war, and hung commemorative bells on an ancient linden tree that grows on the grounds of the St Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv. The bells are a symbol of these children’s voices that must keep being heard, and we must do all we can so that they will not be silenced forever. We must speak for them. This was a very tough, a very emotional event. Everyone shed lots of tears, but I could not cry, even though I had been rent in two. Afterwards, several people came up to me and thanked me for not crying because I could be a support for them, and that because of me, they did not break down and were able to say the things they needed to say.
SO: Thank you for your words. You said that you want to give a voice to children, and that you spend a lot of time talking with children, especially those who have been repatriated [for instance, after their forced displacement to Russia]. What is important for us to know about war in the context of a child’s experience? What do we need to know?
DH: When you ask yourself, ‘What is childhood?’ — what comes to mind are images of your favourite place where you used to go with your parents, or your bedroom or your study spot or your bed. Of your toys, friends, or other locations in your hometown.
If we think about these children who were deported, then they have lost all of this. That is, it lies somewhere in their memory, but they cannot return physically to these places, ever. Many of these children’s parents have been murdered. In many cases, the Russians killed the parents and then abducted the child.
Many children have lost their homes. They will never walk to school down the streets they know. This is a very important routine for any child. And of course, there is the psychological aspect of having been broken down by the Russians: they will never again return to that feeling that they are still a child, that they are safe, that adults are looking out for them. This is because when they ended up under occupation and fell into the hands of the Russian authorities, they lost control over everything. One boy told me that he tried to become utterly emotionless — not because he stopped caring, but because if he didn’t, he would not be able to survive everything that was happening around him. Kira, one of the first girls whom we managed to get back to Ukraine, told us about her experiences living in occupied Mariupol. After her father was killed, she tagged along with strangers. Just imagine: a twelve-year-old child trying to find a way out of occupied Mariupol, among adults who were complete strangers, whilst going through the trauma of losing her father. She slept in bomb shelters, several of which caved in after bombardment. She would eat whatever she could find. She told me: ‘One time I was walking around Mariupol and I saw hundreds of dead bodies, and sometimes I had to step over them. The whole time I would tell myself, “Thank you God, that that’s not me”’.
For these children, war is the end of their childhood. It is the feeling that you are never safe. Recently, I had to bring my daughter on one of my official visits. My daughter is sixteen-and-a-half years old, and she has been deaf since childhood. She is well-adapted but she sleeps without her hearing aid at night, so she doesn’t hear the air raid sirens and cannot wake up by herself. Since my husband is away in the armed forces, I could not leave her with anyone and so I took her with me to Czechia. As soon as we crossed the border, my daughter said: ‘Mama, what does this mean, are there going to be no more air raid sirens? Does it mean we can sleep all night? Does it mean there’s no longer a curfew?’ Then she added: ‘I can’t remember life without all these restrictions. When I became a teenager, the Covid pandemic started and we were all under lockdown. Then the full-scale invasion happened and there were more restrictions. I can’t feel free anymore. I can’t live my life fully and I can’t go back to that stage, ever again.’ All this, coming from a sixteen-year-old child.
SO: Let us return to the topic of forced displacement of children to Russia, which has had resonance globally. You have a portal, Children of War, which is updated daily. Why are the figures there so different to other sources? For instance, the portal gives the figure of over 19,000 children who have been deported, a number which has more or less stayed the same over the past few years, correct? On the other hand, two years ago, the Russians claimed that over 740,000 children had been allegedly evacuated to Russia from occupied Ukrainian territories. How do we confirm this data?
DH: The Russians have one goal here: the genocide of the Ukrainian people. If you destroy a nation’s children, then its people have no future. This is why they murder our children, injure them, break them psychologically, and inflict sexual abuse. Furthermore, they replenish their demographic resources using Ukrainian children. We know that boys as young as seventeen are being enlisted straight into the army of the aggressor state and are receiving their conscription notices. For the Russians, Ukrainian children are just more manpower. They give them political training in order to turn them into Russian citizens.
It is important to understand that this is a clearly calculated policy. This is no accident, and there are clear patterns. We know that they have several methods they use for abducting children. First they murder the parents, then they kidnap the children. They do not let Ukraine open safe corridors to evacuate children who remain in occupied territories. They do not let us remove children from institutional care facilities, and abduct them instead. They separate parents and children at filtration points. They take children straight from the hands of their biological families. One of the most common scenarios is that they take children from occupied territories away, ostensibly to a summer camp, but they do not return these children home afterwards, and never planned to.
This has been proven by the testimony of children whom we have managed to repatriate. As of today, we have managed to return over 1200 children to Ukraine. These children have given testimony about the clearly defined, repeatedly used methods for these various abduction scenarios. We are successful in repatriating children, although these cases are still not happening on a mass scale, unfortunately. These children are returned to Ukraine in special rescue operations, in small groups or even in operations to rescue one individual. However, of course, we would like these operations to be rescuing these children by the thousands.
SO: In your opinion, what is the sense behind the Russian administration’s public communication about this process? Why do they do this?
DH: As you correctly mentioned, earlier in the war, the Russians stated a figure of 740,000 children who had been allegedly evacuated to Russia. It benefited the Russians to disseminate this because they could pose it as if they were rescuing the children. But according to every standard protocol, even if the Russians had indeed evacuated these children for their safety, then they should have delivered these children immediately to an intermediary or third country. These children should not have remained in Russia. Plus, they should have handed over all of these children’s documents.
Instead, the Russians, as usual, have made public statements but have not complied with any of the conventions that they have signed. They have hidden these abducted children. As of today, neither we nor any international organisation can give an exact number of children who have been abducted. The Russians have not passed on information about the number of children who have been taken or their whereabouts to any international agency or organisation, or to a third country — and certainly not to Ukraine. As for the figure on our portal — roughly twenty thousand — that is the number of children about whom we have some personal data. This does not mean that we know where a child is. This does not mean that we have found this child. All this means is that we are aware of some fact that indicates that a child may have been evacuated, abducted, deported, or forcibly displaced. This information provides the basis for our physical search for these children. The Russians are doing their best to prevent us from finding them. Thus it is very difficult to verify children. The latest report by the Yale Humanities Research Laboratory included figures on cases of illegal adoption whereby the child’s names and date of birth had been changed, so that no-one could later verify and find these children.
None of the international processes that might have achieved anything has done so. These instruments were designed with the expectation that all the players on the world stage would play by the rules. In the case of Russia, this approach does not work. The Russians do not care about rules. That is why we insist on tough sanctions, on a unified front between countries, and decisive action on a coalition for repatriating our children so that we may put tough political and economic pressure on the Russian Federation. They only understand the language of force. We might only be talking about Ukrainian children for now, but this truly concerns every child in the world who feels in danger. If things continue like this, tomorrow it could be children from any other country in the world. We are doing all we can in order to establish new, global processes for ensuring the safety of children worldwide. That is why we want more countries to join the International Coalition for the Return of Ukrainian Children. There are currently forty-one members, but we need more. We need the vast majority of countries to be on the side of good, on the side of the protection of children.
SO: What is the correct terminology that should be used when referring to these processes? Are the words ‘abduction’ and ‘deportation’ synonymous in the case of Russian aggression against Ukraine?
DH: The UN has a mechanism — the mandate of the Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, with which we are currently working. For the first time in history, a permanent member of the Security Council — the Russian Federation — has been placed on the ‘list of shame’ under this mandate, and is being investigated for crimes within six categories named as grave violations against the rights of children during armed conflict. Russia has now appeared on the list of shame twice. If Russia appears on this year’s list, making it the third time, then special sanctions against it will have to be implemented. This is an unprecedented process, so we still do not know which sanctions will be instigated.
According to the Children and Armed Conflicts monitoring and reporting mechanism, ‘abduction’ is one of the categories that is considered a grave violation. When it comes to other terminology, we use terms such as ‘deportation’ and ‘forced displacement’. Both are crimes that are indicative of genocide, because they concern the transfer of one ethnic group’s children over to another. Therefore, the forced displacement and deportation of children are regarded as equivalent crimes in terms of accountability. Both, in essence, are child abduction.
However, we should not forget about those children who currently live in occupied territory and every day find themselves at risk of deportation and forced displacement. At present, we estimate that there are roughly 1.6 million Ukrainian children living in occupied territory. They have to endure political indoctrination every day through the Russian school system, which is weaponised to militarise children. The Russians have launched a broad network of organisations, such as their Youth Army and the Movement of the First, which undertake the militarisation of children and their enlistment. Both of these are absolutely illegal.
The figure mentioned above of 1200 children who have been successfully repatriated to Ukraine includes deportees who have been repatriated from the Russian Federation; children who were forcibly displaced to other occupied Ukrainian territories and who have managed to return from there; and children who were successfully rescued from occupied territories before they were displaced (for example, because their parents were threatened with removal of their child or had been notified that the child would be militarised, or conscripted into the army in six months).
SO: Indeed, can the Ukrainian state do anything for children in occupied territories? International processes are currently the only influence it has, since communication at a state level is not possible at the moment.
DH: Right now, the most we can do — and that we are doing — is to de-occupy those territories. We are fighting a war to get back every last scrap of our land. Only after de-occupation will we be able to find out about other cases like Bucha with its mass rapes, or like Izium with its mass graves, or like Kherson, where there were torture chambers for use on children.
Only once we find out what has happened can we effectively start helping children reintegrate and meet their educational, humanitarian, psychological, and medical needs.
We are not able to communicate with people in occupied territories. In most cases, we try to communicate with them via their relatives in territories under Ukrainian control. In all of our campaigns, we repeat, ‘We are fighting for you, every day.’
When we succeed in rescuing a family or individual children, we often hear from them that they were certain that the entirety of Ukraine’s territory was already occupied. Often the children tell us that they were fed the idea that, because they ended up under occupation and did not die there, they would be accused by Ukraine of collaborating with the Russian authorities. The Russians are doing as much as they can to intimidate people.
SO: Children’s testimonies often play an important role in gathering information and developing procedures to rescue them. What is your opinion on the use of children’s testimonies in the final stages of justice?
DH: Certainly, we do all we can so as not to re-traumatise the child. After children return from deportation, forced displacement, or have been rescued from occupied territories, they are referred to a child rights protection centre for interviewing for witness statements in special, child-friendly conditions in accordance with the Barnahus model. In the presence of psychologists, trained investigative officers interview the children in comfortable conditions that are adapted as much as possible to children’s needs, in order to document what has happened to these children. The collection of their testimonies then becomes an evidence base of Russian war crimes.
One of the reasons why the Russians do not want to give back these children is because these children are primary witnesses. There is a Ukrainian initiative led by the President, Bring Kids Back UA, which unites countries and initiatives that are designed to repatriate and reintegrate Ukrainian children as well as build new strategies for this process. I am the head of the Stolen Voices information campaign that works within the framework of this programme. In our campaign, we work with children who have been repatriated and who have undergone a mandatory reintegration and psychological recovery programme.
When people can hear testimonies directly from a witness, be it an adult or a child, then they can really fathom that such things are actually happening. I have a bespoke approach for including children as participants in our information campaign, an approach that has been approved by the UN Human Rights Committee, UNICEF, and various other international children’s organisations. How this approach works is that I retell all the details of a child’s story while the child is not present. This is so that the child is not forced to hear me say this information, or to retell it themselves. Afterwards, the child may enter the room and say a few words of their own volition. Usually, the children talk about their past, about their dreams, hopes, or something else they consider important. If we are on an advocacy tour abroad, then I always take a child psychologist with us on our trip, and the children have a recreational programme while away so that they can take something positive from each trip.
After a reintegration process and a psychological recovery programme, if a child wishes to give a witness statement, then he or she can do so. Children want to tell their stories. They want to be heard; they have a civic position too. Usually, we give them the opportunity to record their interview on camera in one go. These stories are available on open access on the Children of War portal. We never give these children’s contact details to journalists as that is a threat to their safety and could potentially harm them. Instead, we offer journalists and directors pre-recorded witness statements.
SO: We are talking about older children here, am I correct?
DH: Yes, teenagers who can state autonomously, ‘I want to do it, it’s important for me, I want to state my position.’ These are not little children. Most of the participants of the Stolen Voices information campaign are between eighteen and nineteen years old, for instance. They were abducted when they were still minors; however, now they are legal adults who have undergone a reintegration programme and have made the conscious decision to do this. The foremost requirement for taking part [in the Children of War campaign] is not even age, but the child’s psychological readiness.
SO: Media attention is attracted to content about children. If a child dies or is injured after a strike on civilian infrastructure, there is usually a big news story about it, yet the event is not always covered sensitively. And we are surrounded by a lot of this information, all the time. Do you think our ideas about childhood, children, and their place in society have changed over the past few years of war?
DH: Ukraine has a working group, the National Council for Television and Radio Broadcasting, which advises media professionals on, among other things, how to work with content with children in it, and how to cover the war in a way that is fit for consumption by children as well as by adults. Children also discuss the news, perhaps at school or on social media. We are working intensively on this matter in Ukraine, and I am seeing positive developments in the media. We have become more aware in this country that a child’s safety depends on having a safe adult by their side — a mindful adult who understands that the child’s psychological well-being is dependent on him or her.
Therefore, when we discuss content concerning children, we need to safeguard as much as possible the children who are the protagonists of this material. For instance, it is important to blur the faces of the children portrayed, not expose them in any way or publish any of their personal details. Of course, there are certain exceptions — for instance, children who already have a public presence and whose names are already publicly known.
The media plays a very important role, in that it sheds light on how the war has affected Ukrainian children. On the other hand, it is so important to maintain a balance. It is important to consider how much a piece of published material could threaten a child’s safety or ruin the chance for other deported children to be repatriated. There have been instances in which journalists have found a child immediately after repatriation then published an interview with the child and his or her guardians revealing information on how the child managed to return to Ukraine. The Russians track this information, of course, and therefore the use of this channel of communication and repatriation of any further children becomes obsolete.
SO: The issue of childhood during the war is being promoted — if that is an appropriate word to use — as an important case within international advocacy. What have been and currently are your expectations from the international community in the eleventh year of war?
DH: We need to carry on, and we need to grow in force. I am very disturbed by talk of fatigue from the international community. How can we talk about fatigue during the struggle of good against absolute evil? We cannot be neutral in this regard. Russia will not stop with Ukraine. I do not even consider an alternative where Ukraine loses, but if it does, other countries will be next, and this will continue on an unbelievable scale.
Our conversation today has not been about how Ukrainians are victims. We are defenders, fighters who need help. We need weapons and we need publicity. We need maximum advocacy on all fronts. Ukraine must defend what is hers, but we also must continue to grow.
This is not the time for talk about fatigue. It’s time to be talking about what we can do and what more we should do. I was told at the beginning of the full-scale invasion: ‘You have to do one-hundred per cent of what you should and can do. Then do another one-hundred per cent of what must be done. It doesn’t matter if you’re able to do it or not — it still must be done’. These words are what motivates me most.
SO: At the end of our interview, I would like to ask you what you see as the ultimate result of your work? How do you imagine it will look?
DH: Well, as for my dream for the world, I would like for child protection not to have to exist. I wish that all children were already free to exercise their basic rights. After Ukraine’s victory over Russia in this war — which is the thing that I want — we will still have much work to do. I will do my all. I’m not the only one: we have a vast governmental team, as well as the non-governmental sector. These are hundreds of thousands of people who are doing their job, day in, day out, publicly and privately. We have a goal — to fight for every Ukrainian child.
Daria Herasymchuk has been Advisor and Commissioner of the President of Ukraine for Children’s Rights and Rehabilitation since 15 June 2021. She chairs the Interministerial Working Group for co-operation with the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict and the UN MRM Working Group in Ukraine on Children and Armed Conflict. Daria was the initiator and co-chair of the Co-ordination Board for the Protection of Children’s Rights during Martial Law — established to co-ordinate the efforts of central and local executive authorities, other state agencies, local governmental bodies and NGOs — for the first nine months of the full-scale invasion. She also oversees the Children of War platform — the only state portal created to search for, rescue, and release children who have been forcibly displaced or deported. Since 2013, Daria has been the Executive Director and CEO of the NGO Vidchui [Feel it], which supports children and adults with hearing impairments and their families.
Svitlana Osipchuk is the Programme Director of the War Childhood Museum Ukraine, and a researcher focusing on collective memory and trauma. Since 2022, Svitlana has been leading the museum’s efforts to document and share the experiences of people whose childhoods have been affected by war. The museum has collected the largest archive of children’s testimonies about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which will be made available to researchers in the future. These children’s stories and related objects are regularly featured in exhibitions in Ukraine and abroad. In her work, Svitlana takes a sensitive approach to documenting children’s traumatic experiences during wartime. She is currently working on a book about Bykivnia as a site of memory, with support from the Documenting Ukraine programme of the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM).
Image: Stanislav Turina, Drawing (special for the London Ukrainian Review), 2025
