Introduction

Previously, SensusQ has published articles about various UAVs, the social situation in Russia, military trends and other topical issues arising from Russia's war on Ukraine.1 The scope of this article is to provide an insight into the stabilisation operations of the Russian occupation authorities in the temporarily occupied territories (ToT) of Ukraine.

Although SensusQ aims to provide a general overview of Russian stabilisation operations in the ToT of Ukraine, this article focuses mainly on the Kherson oblast and city. Since Kherson was occupied relatively quickly at the beginning of the invasion, its residents were unable to escape the advancing Russian troops. However, Kherson is also a large city that was liberated only 8 months after the occupation. Therefore, there is a lot of relevant material on Kherson that the occupiers are trying to hide in other places.

1. Russia's legislative regulation of stabilisation operations. 

The first months of Russia's invasion of Ukraine came as a shock to the Russian authorities, not only because the military invasion was stalled, but also because a large part of the Ukrainian population was not positively aligned towards the Russian occupation forces, as expected. As the Russians severely underestimated the resistance of the Ukrainian military forces, they were also not prepared to deal with hostile citizens in the occupied territories.As a result, Russia was not ready to conduct stabilisation operations because they simply did not have appropriate forces available such as Rosgvardiya and FSB units in sufficient numbers. Therefore, stabilisation operations were entrusted to military units that were not ready to perform such tasks.As the situation on the frontline required all the available soldiers to stop Ukrainian counterattacks and occupy more territory, as demanded by top Russian politicians, Russia was forced to increase the number of stabilisation forces in ToT of Ukraine.

To alleviate the problem, a number of legislative changes were adopted. First, on October 4, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree [Figure 1] allowing Russians, including conscripts, to serve in the FSB under contract.[1]

As conscripts replaced professional border guards in Russia, the occupation authorities were able to use professionals to increase the number of checkpoints in the ToT of Ukraine. For example, FSB border guards worked at checkpoints and conducted "special control methods" for those who were going to fly from ToT of Ukraine. Their control methods, in addition to document checks, included verbal questioning and lasted much longer for Ukrainian citizens. [2]

Around the same time, the State Duma of the Russian Federation began to prepare a law allowing former Rosgvardiya employees to enter into short-term contracts in ToT of Ukraine. The law was adopted on 14 June 2023.[3] 

In addition, on December 25, 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed additional laws to further bolster Russia’s force generation capacity. Thus, he signed laws allowing the Rosgvardiya to form its own volunteer formations and provide Russians with the opportunity to serve as conscripts in the FSB.[4]

2. Deployment of stabilisation forces. 

Due to the acute need for stabilisation forces, the Rosgvardiya began to transfer all available resources to the TOT of Ukraine even before the above-mentioned laws came into force. For example, as early asMarch 2023, the Rosgvardiya set up a huge open-air camp in the centre of Simferopol. [Figure 2] [5]In addition to the Russian Federation, the occupation forces tried to recruit personnel in the ToT of Ukraine. Thus, in September 2023, they sent SMS messages to the local population of the ToT of Ukraine urging them to join the ranks of Rosgvardiya and other law enforcement agencies.[6]

The Rosgvardiya arrived in larger numbers in July 2024 with its main task being the suppression of Ukrainian partisans. The official reason for increasing the number of Russian National Guard troops was reportedly the high level of "extremism" in the TOT, which in Russia is considered to be everything that does not comply with the will of the Kremlin. According to Pyotr Andryushchenko, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, the Rosgvardiya unit had arrived in occupied Urzuf, Donetsk region to patrol public beaches along the coast from Urzuf to Yalta, Donetsk Oblast. Andryushchenko warned that Rosgvardiya officers in plainclothes were patrolling civilian areas and arbitrarily detaining people based on facial expressions and other random signs. The Rosgvardiya had also increased the number of raids to search for members of the underground.[7][8]

Since the use of conscripts in Ukraine was a taboo subject for President Putin, changes in FSB-related legislation allowed FSB border guards and other professional officers to be replaced with conscripts in order to send professional FSB officers into the ToT of Ukraine to conduct stabilisation operations. Thus, even those conscripts who did not want to go to contract service and be sent to combat zones indirectly supported Russia's war against Ukraine. Moscow is likely trying to recruit and deploy more military occupation forces in order to further impede Ukraine's counteroffensive, establish permanent control over the occupied territories, and suppress guerrilla activity without using frontline troops for stabilisation operations.

3. Role of the FSB and Rosgvardiya in the beginning of Russia's war against Ukraine 

At the beginning of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the stabilisation forces of the FSB and Rosgvardiya did not meet its requirements and so it was mainly the Russian military that had to keep the situation under control. For example, during the occupation of Kherson, which lasted from 2 March to 13 November 2022, the daily reports of the Kherson police mentioned FSB crimes against Ukrainian citizens only three times and Kadyrovites from Rosgvardiya only twice.

• On September 20, armed soldiers of the Russian Federation captured a volunteer in Chernobaivka. FSB officers came to the man's place of residence, tortured him and his wife, searched the house and stole all the food and vodka. After that, the occupiers took the car from the yard, and took the man away to an unknown location.[9]
• On September 29, Kherson police received information about the abduction of 8 people by Russian military and FSB representatives in the oblast. Men and women were taken from their homes and streets in Vesele village, in Kherson, Genichesk and Bilozersk territorial communities.[10]
• On October 22, a resident of Henichesk district reported that representatives of the local occupation authorities entered his apartment together with FSB officers. The occupants took household appliances and other property from the apartment, loaded them into a car and drove away.[11]
• On September 22, citizens from the ToT of Kherson and Oleshky reported that Russian military and Kadyrovites were moving into their apartments and houses and robbing them.[12]
• On November 02, the Kherson police received a report from a resident of the Beryslav district that, on the tip of a local collaborator, the Russian military (Kadyrovites) came to him, interrogated him and tortured him.[13]

After the liberation of Kherson, more detailed information about the FSB's crimes began to emerge. For example, on April 14, 2023, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) published the names of two FSB officers involved in the abduction and torture of civilians in ToT of Kherson: 43-year-old Yuri Belyatsky (ЮрийБеляцкий) from the Novosibirsk oblast and 47-year-old Sergei Sinitsyn (СергейСиницын), call sign "Sabir" from Mordovia. Sergeya Sinitsyn was an operative of the 3rd Department of the 9th Directorate of the Operational Information Department of the 5th Service of the FSB, Yuri Belyatsky was the deputy head of the 9th Directorate of the Operational Information Department of the 5th Service of the FSB.[14]

The SBU found out that on March 31, 2022 Yury Petrovich Belyatsky issued an order to his subordinates to illegally deprive a Kherson resident Andrei of his liberty. FSB officers broke into Andrei’s apartment, seized and embezzled$5,000 and €1,000 a DeLonghi coffee machine, two laptops, a computer system unit, a Longines wristwatch, a camera and a video camera. They threatened Andrei's wife and son with violence. After beating the man, they took him to an unidentified place in the centre of Kherson. There they continued to beat him, imitated shooting and forced to sign a cooperation agreement with the FSB. Eight hours later, in the evening of the same day, the occupiers took the victim away by car and dropped him off in Kherson.[15]

On June 12, 2022, another officer of the same FSB department, Sinitsyn Sergey Viktorovich (call sign ‘Sabir’), issued a warrant for the illegal deprivation of liberty of another Kherson resident, Maksim. FSB officials broke into the victim's country house on Velikiy Potyomkin Island, shot him several times and handcuffed him. After that, they threatened to kill his parents, staged a shooting, brutally beat him and transported him by boat to the right bank of the Dnieper. In Kherson, Maksim was kept in a torture chamber in the building of the regional office of the National Police on Luteranska, 4, for 9 days. In captivity, the victim was often beaten, kept handcuffed to a radiator, was not allowed to go to the toilet, and was tortured about 10 times with electric current using a field phone Tapik. After agreeing to co-operate, Maksim was taken away by car and released in the Slavy Park in Kherson.[16]

4. Russian Army as the main stabilisation force.

4.1 Kidnapping and torture.

Reports of criminal activities by the Russian military have been very common throughout the current conflict. Since the beginning of the Russian invasion and occupation of Kherson, kidnappings have been recorded in the city almost every day. [17] In this way, Russians are trying to intimidate the local population, suppress resistance and force them to cooperate. SensusQ will not publish here the full list of documented cases of kidnapping and torture posted on the Kherson police website, but we will give just a few typical examples.

For example, the police report for June 27 reports four incidents involving the Russian military personnel:[18]

• In the occupied village of Zmiivka, Beryslav district, Russian Federation servicemen came to the home of a 30-year-old man, put him in an enclosed motor truck and drove him in an unknown direction. The whereabouts of the missing person is currently unknown.
• Russian military forcibly captured a 54-year-old local resident. The man was kept for more than a day in the basement of the post office, which was turned into a torture chamber. The occupiers interrogated the man, beat him in various parts of his body, and then released him.
• In Nova Kakhovka, Russian soldiers kidnapped the head of one of the city's educational institutions from his workplace. The man's current locations is unknown.
• Russian military kidnapped a deputy of the regional council and his son, who is a deputy of the village council. The men's whereabouts are currently unknown.

The police report for September 16 reports 3 cases of kidnapping involving the Russian military personnel:[19]

• In the ToT of Kherson, Russian servicemen came to the apartment of a 72-year-old man, searched for weapons and housing documents, tortured him with a hot iron and shot above his ear, then took him away in an unknown direction.
• In the suburbs of the ToT of Kherson, the Russian military kidnapped a local man from his workplace, put a bag over his head and took him to an unknown location.
• In one of the villages of the Beryslav district, Russian military committed the deliberate murder of a local resident and hanged him in his own yard. The occupiers did not allow the family to bury the man, so he was buried in the yard of his house.

4.2 Robbery, looting and destruction.

Kidnapping and torture are not the only methods of intimidating the Ukrainian population and suppressing resistance. Other methods include robbery, looting and destroying of residents' property. As a rule, Russians loot the property of those who are known for their neutral or anti-Russian stance or those who fled the advancing Russian troops, leaving their homes behind. It is logical that those who did not stay to meet the Russian troops were not favourably disposed towards the Russians, and so their property was chosen for looting to intimidate those who remained in the area.

It is noteworthy that Russian military commanders and other officials do not restrict robbery and looting in any way, despite this being a recognised war crime. The reason may be that looting is committed at all levels of the military hierarchy. While lower ranking soldiers loot home electronics, furniture and cars, higher ranks loot grain bunkers, agricultural equipment, and the property of large companies and enterprises. Even the highest ranks of the political leadership are complicit and by committing war crimes, Russian servicemen become criminals in the eyes of the international community. Therefore, they are incentivised to fight for victory, because if Russia capitulated, they would most likely be convicted under international law as war criminals. According to SensusQ, this is the main reason why looting is not only restricted, but even encouraged by Russian leaders.

SensusQ does not publish the full list of documented cases of looting and destruction posted on the Kherson police website, but we provide a few typical examples.

The police report of July 21 said:[20]

• In the village of Bruskynske, Velyka Oleksandrivska community, Russian servicemen looted a farm, illegally seizing agricultural machinery (tractors and cars), seed and 6,000 litres of diesel fuel.
• In the village of Lyubymivka, Russian servicemen seized a VAZ-2106 car from a local resident.
• In the resort village of Shchaslyve, the occupants illegally seized three cars Volkswagen Multivan, Toyota Corolla and Skoda Rapid from the territory of the recreation centre.

On July 28, in three villages of Beryslav district, armed Russian servicemen illegally seized civilian cars VAZ-2106 and Volkswagen Bora, as well as trucks GAZ-3307 and GAZ-53.[21]

On August 02, in the village of Pody, soldiers robbed a local resident's house, taking a washing machine, a microwave oven, a children's bicycle and children's clothes.[22]

After the liberation of Vysokopillya, police recorded numerous facts of looting by the Russian military on September 13, who had looted houses and taken away cars, motorcycles and bicycles of local residents. There were almost no surviving buildings left in the village, all of them were either destroyed by shelling or looted by the Russian military. [Figure 4] [23]

On September 21, Kherson police reported that in the village of Stepanivka, after an illegal search of a local resident's house by the armed military of the Russian Federation, property disappeared from the house. This included computer equipment, a video surveillance system, game consoles, branded perfumes and money. In addition, the occupiers damaged any property that could not be taken from the house.[24]

On October 10, the Kherson police reported:[25]

• In the Beryslavskyi and Kakhovskyi districts, the Russian military looted two agricultural enterprises, taking tractors, navigation systems for sowing, combine harvesters and cars.
• In the ToT of Kherson, the occupiers seized property from a number of state institutions and private companies including:
• The office premises of the state executive service department;
• Representatives of the so-called of the "Military State Administration of Kherson" with the armed support of the Russian military seized the territory of an enterprise for wholesale trade in wood and building materials. The value of the seized property is more than UAH 30 million;
• In the Kherson centre, the Russian military together with representatives of the occupation authorities, seized the premises and property of an audit firm;
• In the regional centre and Stepanivka, the occupiers seized the territory of a plant producing electrical equipment for engines and vehicles. The total value of the seized property is almost UAH 40 million;
• In Kherson and the village of Stepanivka, the occupiers seized the territory of an enterprise producing dry building mixtures. The value of the seized property (buildings, office premises, trucks, production equipment, warehouses and raw materials) is almost UAH 500 million.

Robbery and looting were not the only crimes against Ukrainians property committed by the Russian military to intimidate the local population. What they couldn’t or didn’t want to take, they destroyed, set fire to or even blew up. On October 04, the Kherson police reported, that in the Skadovskyi district, the Russian military arrived at a couple's place of residence, beat the husband for his pro-Ukrainian position, and took his wife to an unknown location with her whereabouts still unknown. The occupants disposed the man out of his house, which they then blew up.[26]

5. Stabilisation operations of the FSB and the Rosgvardiya in Russia's war on Ukraine.

5.1 Kidnaping and torturing continues.

While the FSB and the Rosgvariya have taken over the stabilization task from the Russian army, kidnappings and torture remain among the favoured methods of intimidation and subjugation of the local Ukrainian population. In August 2024, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, stated that since the beginning of the Russia's war on Ukraine at least 10,000 residents of Mariupol have been arrested, and up to 100 Ukrainians expressing pro-Ukrainian sentiments disappear from occupied Mariupol every month.[27]

The Ukrainian global initiative "Tribunal for Putin" (T4P) has identified 5340 victims of enforced disappearances who have been detained by the Russian authorities and whose whereabouts are unknown in the ToT of Ukraine as of the end of July 2024. According to the T4P, Russian authorities have carried out two waves of enforced disappearances in Ukraine. The first wave followed immediately after the full-scale invasion, when the Russian authorities followed pre-compiled lists and detained Ukrainian politicians, volunteers, public figures, human rights advocates, journalists and others who could oppose the Russian occupation. The Russian authorities carried out a second wave of enforced disappearances based on individual reports of suspicion against specific individuals, such as residents suspected of photographing Russian military equipment. T4P noted that these individuals may remain missing for many years, as the Russian authorities do not provide any information to relatives and do not include missing persons in the lists of prisoners or dead persons. T4P noted that approximately 4% (around 160) of the cases of enforced disappearances involve Ukrainian children.[28]

Some people in ToT of Ukraine have even been kidnapped more than once. For example, Zhanna Kiselova [Figure 5],a 54-year-old journalist and politician from Nova Kakhovka, has been kidnapped twice. Zhanna was the editor of the newspaper "Kakhovskaya Zorya", which was published before the Russia's war on Ukraine and since 2020 she has been a deputy of the Kakhovka City Council from the Servant of the People party. First, she was kidnapped by armed Russian soldiers from her home on September 20, 2022 and kept in a basement for almost a month.[29] On June 27, 2024, she was kidnapped by Russians for the second time. Her current whereabouts are unknown. [30] [31]

A longer and more complex story of kidnapping and torture, which attracted increased international attention, took place in Berdyansk between September 2022 and June 2023. Two16-years old boys, Tigran Oganisyan, who lived with his grandmother at this time, and Nikita Khanganov, [Figure 6] were detained by the occupation police from their homes in September 2022, tortured and forced to confess to something they probably had not committed. The European Parliament demanded that the occupants release the children and allow Tigran to return to Germany where his parents lived. The children were held hostage before being freed, armed, and allegedly killing a man before being killed by the FSB as terrorists.[32]The Ukrainian resistance claims that the FSB officers gave the boys a choice of either dying under torture, or to take a gun and go shooting. With the most likely staged incident the FSB achieved three goals:[33] [34]

• First, to demonstrate once again the “successful” work of the FSB and the “liquidation” of dangerous “terrorists”.
• Second, to get rid of the teenagers, as they were witnesses of crimes committed on them in the basements.
• Third, to accuse Ukrainian partisans of recruiting teenagers.

Fictitious arrests and staged crimes have been quite common in the ToT of Ukraine. In July 2023, the Ukrainian resistance movement "Atesh" reported that the Russians were preparing mass “searches” in Crimea and were going to conduct demonstrative “identification” of Ukrainian patriots and resistance activists. Although, the FSB and police officials did not have specific information, Crimean Tatars were suspected to be incriminated with “extremism”. The security forces of the occupation administration were ordered to falsify criminal cases and plant “prohibited items” directly during the search. The witnesses were fake persons co-operating with the FSB and police.[35]As the fictitious arrests did not have the desired effect on the local population, in February 2024, FSB cells in Crimea were allocated for inspection by senior officials sent from Moscow. Allegedly, the authorities learnt about fictitious arrests carried out by local FSB officers, and local operatives were blamed for the failure of the fight against partisan movements on the peninsula. Despite all efforts, local FSB officers failed to identify the centre of the Atesh movement, intimidation did not bring the desired result, and pro-Ukrainian sentiments grew. [36]

Ironically, torture is used not only to intimidate pro-Ukrainian sentiment, but also against soldiers who do not want to fight. For example, in August 2023, the occupiers had set up a torture room in the basement of a house on Lenina Street, 39 in the village of Rozivka, Zaporizhzhya Oblast. There, they allegedly abused and raped their own servicemen who had previously deserted. According to local residents, screams were constantly heard outside, which also served as a means of intimidating the local population.[37]

Kidnapping and torture have been, and remain, one of the main methods by which Russian occupiers sow fear and coerce local residents into co-operation. Only sincere collaborators and great pretenders can feel safe from such physical violence in the occupied territories.

5.2 Nationalisation and confiscation of the real estate of pro-Ukrainian citizens began.

The nationalisation and confiscation of property and real estate have two main objectives for the occupation forces. Firstly, it is to intimidate and coerce Ukrainian citizens in theToT of Ukraine to loyalty to the occupation forces. Second, the ‘nationalised’ houses have been used to accommodate newly arrived citizens from the Russian Federation, which is part of a broader strategy of demographic and cultural occupation of Ukrainian territories.

Already in June, 2023, in the ToT of the Kherson oblast, the occupiers took land from local residents who had left or refused to obtain a Russian passport. These lands were transferred to local collaborators and Russian legal entities.[38]In January 2024, families of Russian military personnel began to move to theToT of Zaporizhiaoblast, and in particular to Melitopol, to be closer to their husbands and wanted to officially re-register the apartments taken from local residents. Since everyone wanted to appropriate the best apartments, conflicts began to arise between the newcomers. This resulted in a Russian family evicting a Kadyrovite and his wife from an illegally obtained apartment in Melitopol.[39]

By February 2024, the Russian invaders had seized more than 100,000 units of real estate in the ToT of the Zaporizhia Oblast, which they recognized as "ownerless". The occupation administrations sent out notices about allegedly ownerless real estate. If the owner failed to provide original documents within ten days, the property was registered as ownerless, with the corresponding consequences. This applied not only to houses and apartments whose owners had left in the TOT, but also to those where the owners lived, but did not have the original title documents, or where the property was occupied, but the housing was registered to another person who had left the area.[40] [41]

In July 2024, the Crimean occupation Anti-Terrorism Commission issued documents instructing Russian law enforcement agencies to “compile a list of individuals and legal entities” that allegedly had ties with “unfriendly” foreign states, in order to forcibly seize property from those on the list.[42]Thus, in Crimea, the assets of the former Prime Minister of Ukraine Arseniy Yatsenyuk were nationalized, including an educational building, a garage and a large plot of land in Yalta. In addition, the property of Ukraine's Eurovision 2016 winner Susana Jamaladinova, known as Jamala, [Figure 7] fell under nationalization. She had movable and immovable property and 2 land plots in Alushta. The apartment of the family of Zelensky's associate, Ukrainian politician and oligarch Vitaliy Khomutynnyk in the village of Livadia on the southern coast of Crimea was also nationalized. Among the nationalized assets are the property of the family of the former Ukrainian MP Lydia Kotelyak, who sponsors the Ukrainian security forces in the Donbass, the Dolphin Therapy Center in Alushta (the beneficiary is a deputy of the Brovary District Council of the Kyiv oblast), the assets of the holding company Kyivgorstroy, the Porto Mare park-hotel (the founder is Ukrainian citizen Vadim Vayspapir, who sponsors the Armed Forces of Ukraine).[43]

In August 2024, the Russian authorities began offering Russian citizens land in ToT of Crimea in exchange for military service. The occupation administration of Crimea announced that it would issue free land plots in ToT of Crimea to Russian citizens who sign a military service contract with the Russian MoD, regardless of the Russian citizen's place of residence.[44]Thus, the nationalization and confiscation of properties and real estate not only serves the purpose of intimidating Ukrainian citizens, but the issuance of “nationalized” residences is also part of the motivational package for the loyal servants of the Russian Federation.

6. FSB and Rosgvardiya officers are increasingly recruiting collaborators and informants

In August 2023, the resistance movement Atesh reported that employees of the "Crimean railway" administration had been instructed by FSB officers to urge the company's employees to increase vigilance in identifying pro-Ukrainian sentiments. According to the FSB representatives, they allegedly managed to carry out a number of detentions on the signals of cashiers working on trains. In addition to video surveillance, sound recordings were made in the ticket offices and in the cabins of commuter trains. Employees were advised to look closely at passengers' electronic devices, to listen carefully to conversations between passengers and, if they heard anything, immediately report it to transport security representatives or police officers. It is likely that similar activities were conducted for managers of other enterprises.[45]

Sometimes Rosgvardiya representatives have approached local residents and have directly offered cooperation, in particular, providing information on suspicious individuals who leak data about Russian forces to Ukrainian structures.[46]

The FSB also recruited criminals in prisons in Crimea and placed them in the same cell with political prisoners. In this way they tried to obtain information from political prisoners. They were particularly interested in the activities of partisan/pro-Ukrainian movements in the ToT of Crimea. As a reward for their successful work, the criminals were released.[47]

7. Russians attempted to disrupt and take control of the resistance communication in the ToT of Ukraine.

Stabilization forces are trying to control Internet traffic in the ToT of Ukraine. Local Internet service providers in Crimea, Agronet and Komnet, have been ordered to report to the FSB all cases of local residents using VPN services. [48] In addition, in November 2023, Crimea began to experience regular internet outages. Most likely, the occupation authorities deliberately interrupted the connection in order to prevent the transfer of information during significant incidents. In this way, they also tried to prevent pro-Ukrainian citizens from assisting the Ukrainian defence forces and informing about the movements of Russian troops. [49]

Occupation authorities regularly check people's mobile phones in an attempt to find evidence of links to Ukrainian forces. [50] [51] This has been especially intense after recent successful attacks by Ukrainian forces. For example, at the end of December 2023, after the destruction of the vessels “Novocherkassk” and “UTS-150” a large group of FSB operatives were sent to Feodosia to find those responsible for the destruction of the vessels. All over the city there were raids on local residents, smartphones were checked and homes were searched. [52]

To infiltrate the Atesh resistance movement, identify its supporters and discredit the movement, the FSB has created fake Atesh bots. The channels are almost identical. They differ only in the number of subscribers, and there are also slight differences in the spelling of the coordinators' accounts and email. [53] [54] [55] Also, the Russian special services, under the guise of local activists, regularly write to Atesh coordinators with proposals to organize terrorist attacks in places where civilians are crowded together, in order to blame Atesh for organizing them. They use fake Atesh accounts, falsify dialogues with Atesh coordinators, and try to provoke Atesh supporters to carry out such terrorist attacks. Their goal is to discredit the resistance forces in the ToT of Ukraine and mobilise as many Russians as possible who will want to take revenge for the “Ukrainian terrorist attacks.” [56]

8. Technical tools in stabilisation operations

Checking mobile phones is not the only measure by which the occupants control the communication of residents on ToT of Ukraine. In March 2023, SIGINT equipment was also installed on the Rosgvardiya building in Simferopol on the Uchbovyi Ln to intercept the calls of Crimean residents. [57]

In April 2024, paramilitaries with wearable video recorders and body cameras began to appear on public transport. [Figure 8] [58] It is likely that Russian officials recorded their patrols in an attempt to identify those filming military equipment and other secret facilities.

Ukrainian supporters were identified not only by patrols with mobile cameras, but also with the help of static cameras. In June 2024, the number of stationary surveillance cameras began to increase on the coast of Yevpatoriya in Crimea. This was probably due to the frequent publication of photos of Russian fortifications on the Internet, and with the help of cameras, attempts were made to identify pro-Ukrainian persons photographing the fortifications. [59]

9. Occupation authorities are targeting children of Ukrainian supporters.

One way to force locals to cooperate with occupational forces has been to manipulate their children. In one scenario, Russians separate children from their families during a so-called filtration processes. Parents are arrested without charge and their children are simply taken away. There was one case when a father of three children was arrested and not released for three months. By that time, the children were already in Russia. In another scenario, children are simply removed from their families. Sometimes this is done by depriving them of parental rights. This often happens with "troublesome parents" who do not want to cooperate with the occupation authorities, for example, they do not want to obtain a Russian passport. [60]

In July 2024, the occupation authorities of the ToT of Zaporizhia oblast signed an agreement with the Rosgvardiya on the organization of military training courses in schools. The agreement allows the Rosgvardiya to teach Ukrainian children the basics of security and counter-terrorism measures. The Rosgvardiya also offers such classes in occupied Melitopol and Kostyantynivka Zaporizhia oblast. The mayor of the Ukrainian city of Melitopol, Ivan Fedorov suggested that a Rosgvardiya unit from Makhachkala, Republic of Dagestan, would participate in the training in Berdyansk. Rosgvardiya is likely interested in training children in occupied schools to brainwash the youth and create its own mobilization reserve of Ukrainian youth, which it probably hopes to use in the future to further stabilise the occupied territories. [61]

Russian authorities are also indoctrinating deported Ukrainian children through military-patriotic education programmes outside Ukraine. Hundreds of Ukrainian children deported by Russian authorities from their homes in Ukraine to Russia are being indoctrinated in Kremlin-backed military-patriotic educational camps. More than 330 children from occupied Ukraine were in a children's camp organised by the Kremlin-linked "Times for Young Heroes" program in Volgograd Oblast in July 2024, where they learned to assemble and shoot assault rifles, fly drones, and perform other military tasks. Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets has stated that "the Kremlin is forcibly shaping a generation of Ukrainian children who are taught hatred and violence towards everything Ukrainian" through such military re-education programs. [62]

Russia's attempts to use military-patriotic education classes to ideologically process Ukrainian children and youth and potentially prepare them for future military service against their home country are a clear violation of international law.

10. Russian passportisation of citizens of the ToT of Ukraine.

On April 27, 2023 Russian President Vladimir Putin signed Decree № 307 “On the Peculiarities of the Legal Status of Certain Categories of Foreign Citizens and Stateless Persons in the Russian Federation” in which persons residing in the occupied territories of Russia who have declared their desire to retain their current citizenship and have refused to obtain a Russian passport, are defined as “foreign citizens and stateless persons currently residing in the Russian Federation.” The decree states that such persons may continue to reside in the occupied territories until July 1, 2024, which implies the possibility of their deportation after this date. The decree establishes coercive methods of inducing residents of the occupied territories to obtain a Russian passport, and sets the conditions for the deportation of Ukrainians who do not agree to become Russian citizens. [63]

Based on this decree, the head of the so called “Donetsk People’s Republic” (DNR) Denis Pushilin signed a decree on June 20, 2023, that created a working group to regulate and oversee the creation of “temporary detention centres for foreign citizens and stateless persons” in ToT of Donetsk Oblast and defines these individuals as subject to expulsion or deportation from what is considered Russian territory under Russian law. [64]

On September 1st, 2024 Russian Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin [Figure 9] reportedly completed the first stage of work on proposals for the building and restoring "temporary detention centres for foreign citizens and stateless persons" throughout occupied Ukraine. Initially Russian authorities used detention centres to isolate and punish people who failed to pass Russia's arbitrary "filtration" practices, which were aimed at identifying and neutralizing pro-Ukrainian sentiment in the occupied territories. But now they are "re-education" centres for those who refuse Russian passports before December 31, 2024. This is the current deadline that the Kremlin has set for occupation authorities to complete the issuance of passports to citizens of occupied Ukraine. [65]

The establishment of "temporary detention centres" has created formal conditions for the occupation administration to detain residents of occupied territories. These are classified as “foreign citizens and stateless persons” according to Decree № 307, and officially designates them for deportation from the occupied territories. "Temporary detention centres" also appear to serve as a coercive tool aimed at forcing residents of the occupied territories to obtain Russian passports out of fear of arbitrary detention and possible deportation. All efforts aimed at codifying and formalising the deportation of Ukrainians constitute a deliberate campaign of ethnic cleansing and therefore violate the Geneva Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

11. Conclusion

Putin has said, that Ukraine should not be an independent state and that Ukrainians are actually Russians. [66] Apparently, the ultimate goal for Russian stabilisation operations has also been to carry out genocide and eliminate Ukrainians in the occupied territories. For example, on August 24, 2024, Dmitry Rogozin, the so-called Russian senator for the ToT of Zaporizhia Oblast and former deputy prime minister, boasted that he had burned Ukrainian books and called for all 'Ukrainianess' to be 'burnt out at the root'. [67]

There are probably many people in the Russian state who retain maximalist objectives for the war, including the destruction of Ukrainian culture, identity and statehood. The combined forces of the Russian Army, the FSB and the Rosgvardiya have been zealously trying to achieve this goal using every tool and method at their disposal. SensusQ's position is that Putin's ideology must be stopped in Ukraine, otherwise Putin will use every opportunity to expand his sphere of influence and weaken democracy in Europe.

Russia will most likely choose to continue its genocidal war against Ukraine unless it faces significant setbacks on the battlefield supported by strong Western support for Ukraine. It is highly unlikely that any predictable Russian leader after Putin will be more inclined to negotiate peace and a just resolution to the war. The Kremlin has spent years denying the existence of the Ukrainian nation and delegitimizing Ukrainian sovereignty, and this effort has had widespread and likely long-term impacts on Russian society and elite opinion. [68]

Russian officials in both Putin's inner circle and the broader Russian government have publicly stated their aversion to peace talks with Ukraine on terms other than capitulation, and Putin's successor is more likely to maintain these views than to reject them in the absence of significant Russian setbacks. Any success would demonstrate to the Russians that aggression is the way to achieve their goals, and therefore Russia would not stop, but sooner or later would launch another conventional or asymmetric aggression against the next target. It is therefore essential for the democratic world to make Russia lose this war and demonstrate that aggression is unacceptable in the 21st century.

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