“Qalmost 37,000 people are missing: children, civilians and soldiers,” Ukrainian Commissioner Dmytro Loubinets posted on Facebook.
Despite the new count, he stressed, “these numbers could be much higher”, as the collection of information is still ongoing.
Since the start of the Russian invasion in February 2022, tens of thousands of people have died, including civilians and soldiers, but there is no reliable global number.
Procedures to identify the dead or missing can take months.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated at the end of February that 31,000 of his soldiers had been killed in two years of war, in one of the rare occasions on which Ukraine has officially taken stock of its military losses.
The number of civilian casualties is also unknown, as there is no reliable information on the territories occupied by Russia since the beginning of the invasion, which led to the destruction of many cities and villages.
The case of Mariupol, besieged in spring 2022 by Russian forces and currently occupied, is emblematic because, according to Kyiv, tens of thousands of people died there and were buried under rubble or in mass graves.
Furthermore, according to Dmytro Loubinets, “around 1,700” Ukrainians are being “illegally detained” by Russia.
Ukraine also estimates that, in the last two years, at least 20,000 Ukrainian children have been deported from areas occupied by Russia.
According to Kyiv, to date the country’s authorities have repatriated just under 400 children.
In spring 2023, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant against President Vladimir Putin and Russian Children’s Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova for their roles in the “deportation” of Ukrainian children to Russia, charges that the Kremlin reject.
The war in Ukraine began on February 24, 2022, when Russia launched a military offensive under the pretext of defending pro-Russian territories and ‘denazifying’ the country.
The Russian invasion was condemned by most of the international community, which responded by sending weapons to Ukraine and reinforcing economic and political sanctions on Moscow.
Read Also: Zelensky enacts controversial law to mobilize more military personnel
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Source: https://www.noticiasaominuto.com/mundo/2542104/pelo-menos-37-mil-desaparecidos-apos-dois-anos-de-invasao-russa
