Ukrainians claim Russian pressure in occupied territories
2023.03.03 13:33
Ukrainians claim Russian pressure in occupied territories
By Ray Johnson
Budrigannews.com – Olha Lukina, 65, rushed to a registry office as soon as her granddaughter was born. It was one of the last Ukrainian citizenship programs for newborns in the then-Russian-occupied southern city of Kherson.
That May day, Kateryna was born during one of the darkest periods in Ukraine’s history. She became Ukraine’s newest citizen.
According to Leonid Remyga, chief physician at Kherson City Clinical Hospital, the city’s sole operational hospital, Russia made it a requirement for all newborns to acquire Russian citizenship later in the occupation.
Last year, Russia occupied Kherson for eight months before Ukrainian soldiers took it back in November. Initially, many residents returned, but Russian bombardment across the Dnipro River has rendered Kherson more like a ghost town.
Ukrainian parents were pressured to accept Russian citizenship for their newborns early on in the occupation. Natalia Lukina and Oleksii Markelov, Remyga and Kateryna’s parents, claim that this included denying them free diapers and baby food.
This serves as an illustration of how people living in towns and cities captured by Russian forces in the east and south of Ukraine had to deal with sudden and sometimes dangerous changes in the rules and demands made by the occupiers.
According to Natalia Lukina, 42, “When we asked for diapers, the Russians told us, ‘If you come without Russian birth certificates, we will not give you diapers.’ “
Oleksii Markelov, Lukina’s partner, stated, “The majority of small child parents with little income during the war accepted free diapers from Russians.” There was not a single penny of cash.”
On the residents’ account, the FSB, Russia’s intelligence agency, did not respond to a request for comment. The FSB helps to enforce rules in Ukraine’s occupied territories.
Lukina refused to alter her daughter’s birth certificate, which was issued two months after Russia took Kherson.
Reuters has seen Kateryna’s Ukrainian paperwork that has been stamped by the justice ministry of Ukraine. A request for clarification regarding the situation in Kherson during the Russian occupation was unanswered by the ministry.
Lukina said in an interview in her cramped home, where she and Markelov live with their three children and their elderly mother Olha, without electricity or running water, “We told (Russians) that the baby was born in Ukraine and is Ukrainian, not Russian.”
The Russian-controlled side of the Dnipro, from which troops regularly fire artillery at Kherson, is just 1.5 kilometers (one mile) away from the house.
The doctor Remyga claimed that until soldiers fired him on June 7, he continued to follow Ukrainian laws during the initial stages of the occupation.
Remyga told Reuters at the hospital, “They conducted such a propaganda campaign, that Russia is here forever.” But then FSB agents would say that families would have problems if they didn’t get Russian documents.
Remyga claimed that he became ill in June and spent a month in the hospital under the watch of soldiers. The subsequent month, he was able to get away.
He claimed that on September 20, FSB agents took him into custody, cuffed him, and placed a bag over his head before transporting him to an unidentified detention facility, where he was questioned.
He claimed that the officers released him at the beginning of October and prohibited him from returning to the hospital.
Remyga stated that he returned to work on November 12, the day Ukraine regained control of Kherson.
On Remyga’s account, the FSB did not respond to a request for comment.
Parents in Ukrainian hospitals receive a basic medical record of their baby’s birth, but they must go to a registry office for a Ukrainian citizen’s birth certificate, which grants citizenship.
According to Olena Klimenko, head of the regional registration office in Kherson, many parents delayed visiting Russian-controlled registry offices during the occupation.
According to Klimenko, many of those parents registered their children for Ukrainian citizenship after the occupation ended. She lacked accurate statistics.
According to Klimenko, Russian officials recorded the babies and Ukrainian registration workers did not cooperate with them, so it is unclear how many of them received Russian citizenship.
According to Remyga, the number of births at Kherson City Clinical Hospital decreased from 1,200 in the year before the war to 489 in the year 2022.
According to him, the drop was a reflection of the fact that many mothers left to give birth in Ukraine or another country.
The information has not been confirmed and may be fabricated or have an isolated case. Source Reuters.
