Invaders moving their families from Crimea to Russia — General Staff
Some categories of citizens were evacuated from Crimea (Photo:Reuters)
The evacuation of certain categories of citizens from the territory of Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Crimea has been observed again, the Ukrainian military’s General Staff said in its morning report on Facebook on March 1.
“Recently, servicemen of the Russian occupation forces stationed in Perevalne have been sending their families to Russia,” the report says.
The reported movement of Russian citizens from occupied Ukrainian territory comes as Ukraine says it is gearing up for a fresh offensive to liberate more of its territory from Russian occupation. Crimea has been under Russian military occupation since late February 2014.
Earlier, the Ukrainian General Staff reported that representatives of the so-called “authorities” in Kherson Oblast are preparing to flee to the territory of Russian-occupied Crimea, fearing that the region will be de-occupied.
According to the Ukrainian military’s South Operational Command, Russian troops in the left-bank Kherson Oblast (eastern bank of the Dnipro River) are also trying to move closer to Crimea.
Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council estimates that at least 600,000 Russians have moved to Crimea since Moscow began its military occupation of the Ukrainian peninsula – another estimate (by Black Sea News) puts the influx of Russians at around 1 million.
It is illegal under the Geneva Conventions for an occupying power to transfer part of its own population into an area under military occupation.
According to the International Criminal Court, such a transfer of population constitutes a war crime.
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