US accuses Russia of deporting 1.6 million Ukrainians detained in “filtration camps”

Now, the United States claims to have compelling evidence that “hundreds of thousands” of Ukrainian citizens have been “forcibly deported” after going through one of the the 21 fields that the intelligence services Americans have detected with satellite images.

These are installations that, for the most part, are located in occupied Ukrainian territory – especially in the Donbas area – and that previously they served as schools, markets and even prisons. At least that’s how he maintains it a report by researchers from Yale University and endorsed by the US State Department.

[La mayoría cree que el apoyo de España a Ucrania es “insuficiente” y que la guerra sólo acabará con la expulsión de los rusos]

The document states that they are between 900,000 and 1.6 million Ukrainians sent extrajudicially to Russia, often to isolated regions far from major cities. Figures that include more than 260,000 children who were separated from their families and even forcibly removed from orphanages before being put up for adoption.

The “filtering camps” serve to screen, since Russian officials have the mission of “identifying people who are compatible with their control,” according to details. Linda Thomas GreenfieldUS ambassador to the UN, at a Security Council meeting last week.

Those who pass that test have their passport confiscated and are issued a Russian one. All in an attempt to change the demographic composition from some parts of Ukraine. Probably from those where Russia is preparing annexation referendums, such as Kherson.

On the other hand, those who are considered “a threat to Russian control” or have pro-Ukrainian leanings end up “detained or disappeared”, according to the report, which collects direct testimonies and survivors of these “filtering” operations.

These same witnesses are the ones who have denounced the frequent threats, harassment and the tortures carried out by the Russian security forces in those compounds.

“Fantasies of the West”

This is not the first time these accusations have been leveled at the Kremlin. In fact, months ago, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported that Russian forces and their allies were deporting people, including those fleeing the fighting.

An act that constitutes “a serious violation of the laws of war amounting to a war crime and a possible crime against humanity,” according to the organization, who interviewed 54 people who had been victims of these leaks or who knew victims. Many had even helped Ukrainians flee the area where they were being held captive.

According to HRW, a large majority of those transferred were fleeing the port city of Mariupol, which was devastated and captured in mid-May by Russian troops. Others came from the Kharkov regionin the east, where Ukraine is carrying out a fierce counteroffensive.

[Ucrania reconquista 700 kilómetros cuadrados de territorio y se prepara para cercar a Izium]

Russia has not hesitated to deny the information, which it has described as “fantasy”. And not only that: the Russian ambassador to the UN, Vassily Nebenziaaccused Western countries of trying to discredit his country, according to the agency Reuters.

In reality, he explained, 3.7 billion Ukrainians, including 600,000 children, have gone “voluntarily” to Russia or to occupied separatist areas in eastern Ukraine (such as Lugansk or Donetsk). However, he assured, “they are not kept in prisons“, but that “they live freely in Russia” and that “no one prevents them from moving or leaving the country”.