10 June 2025

The President of Ukraine Imposed Sanctions on the Artek Camp

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed Decree No. 395/2025, which enacts the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine regarding the expansion of the list of individuals and entities subject to restrictive measures. The sanctions list includes 46 individuals as well as several organizations involved in implementing the policy of forced assimilation and ideological influence on children from occupied territories.

Among the entities subject to the new restrictions are the Artek Children’s Center, the Rassvet (Sunrise) Center for Humanitarian and Cultural Initiatives, and the pro-Kremlin state-sponsored movement Rukh pershykh (Movement of the first). These structures are used by Russia as tools to cultivate loyalty to the occupation regime, impose distorted narratives about the armed aggression against Ukraine, and eradicate Ukrainian identity through forced Russification and militarization.

Ukrainian and international human rights organizations have repeatedly drawn attention to cases of the forced transfer of Ukrainian children, their detention in closed institutions without the consent of their legal guardians, and instances of unlawful adoption. These actions qualify as the forcible transfer of children from one national group to another, which, according to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, constitutes one of the hallmarks of this crime.