The story of Little Margarita

to Marta Serafini

BBC Reconstruction: The little girl, not even one year old, was hospitalized in Kherson. A woman took her away, and then the child reappeared in Russia, where the politician Sergei Mironov, close to the Tsar, named her “Marina.”

From our correspondent
Odessa – a key ally of Vladimir Putin and a young girl taken from a Ukrainian orphanage. The mystery beginsAugust 2022When a woman dressed in purple appears in…Kherson Children’s Hospital, where 10-month-old Margarita is being treated for an attack of bronchitis. Before arriving at the hospital, the little girl was living in the regional orphanage in Kherson where her mother left her. then One day he disappeared with 43 other children. Reconstructing the story of Margarita is BBCIn cooperation with Ukrainian investigator Victoria Novikova. Six months after the Russians occupy Kherson, a woman dressed in purple appears at the hospital as the “Chief of Moscow Children’s Affairs” and says she wants to see Margarita. Shortly after the woman leaves, the hospital receives a phone call from a Russian-appointed official demanding the little girl’s immediate resignation.

A week later, when Margarita returns to the orphanage, the staff are asked to prepare the little girl for the trip. According to eyewitnesses, Russian men – Some wear military-style camouflage pants, one wears dark glasses and carries a briefcase – they come to pick up Margarita. Seven weeks later, Igor Kastyukevich, a Russian deputy in military uniform, appeared at the orphanage and with other officials, and began organizing the deportation of the other remaining children, including Maxim, Margarita’s half-brother. Video footage – posted on Telegram by Kastyukevich himself – shows the children being rounded up and being transported in buses and ambulances. “They will go to safety in the Crimea,” Kastyukevich himself declares. For five months, thanks to the investigations conducted by Novikova, the “woman in purple” was identified: she was Inna Varlamova. The investigator also discovers a Russian document allowing this Margarita was transferred to a Moscow hospital for medical examinations. This name appears in the document: Inna Varlamova. A search on social media confirms: it was the mysterious woman in purple who visited Margarita in the children’s ward. Varlamova works in the Russian parliament, although it is not clear in what capacity, and owns a property in Podolsk, near Moscow.

The investigations BBC They will find out that Varlamova took Margarita away by train to Moscow. Then the second discovery: a document explaining how Varlamova recently married political party leader Sergei Mironov. He is a 70-year-old former paratrooper and the leader of the Just Russia party – part of the Russian state-sanctioned opposition – which supports President Putin. His name is on the sanctions blacklists of several Western countries, including the United Kingdom and the European Union. But no BBC He discovers something else. That is, the names of the woman in purple and the Russian MP appear in Birth certificate for a 14-month-old girl named “Marina”. Marina’s date of birth is October 31, 2021, the same day that Margarita was born. Margarita Prokopenko’s name was changed to Marina MironovaIn honor of his adoptive father Sergei Mironov. His birthplace is listed as Podolsk.

there Geneva Convention It states that it is unlawful to deport civilians in times of war unless it is necessary for security or military imperatives and is temporary. The Convention also prohibits changing a child’s marital status. When the International Criminal Court indicted President Putin and Children’s Commissioner Maria Lvova Belova earlier this year, prosecutors in The Hague said… Illegal deportation of hundreds of Ukrainian children from orphanages and children’s institutions It was carried out “with the intent of permanently removing these children from their families.” This comes in the wake of President Putin’s decision to issue decrees that had the effect of facilitating the adoption of Ukrainian children by Russians. Lvova-Belova responded that Russia only takes children into foster care or guardianship. there BBC He wrote to Sergei Mironov and Inna Varlamova asking where Margarita was now, but they did not respond. Ukraine says it has identified 19,546 children brought to Russia. He claims that fewer than 400 have returned. But Russia continues to question these numbers.