Death, injury and permanent family separation are among the traumatic events that have upended the lives of Ukraine's children in the three years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of the country, according to a report by the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) released on Friday, as a high-level independent inquiry into the invasion also delivered its latest mandated report to the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) on Wednesday.
“The ongoing hostilities and occupation of parts of Ukraine by the Russian Federation have caused large-scale human rights violations and inflicted unimaginable suffering on millions of children. Their rights have been undermined in every aspect of life, leaving deep scars, both physical and psychosocial,” UN human rights chief Volker Türk said in a statement.
Between February 24, 2022 and December 31, 2024, OHCHR verified that 669 children were killed and 1,833 injured, many as a result of the widespread use of explosive weapons in populated areas. Of these, 521 were killed and 1,529 injured in Ukraine-controlled territory, and 148 were killed and 304 injured in currently occupied territory.
Since these are UN-verified figures, the actual numbers are likely to be much higher. Many reports, particularly from certain locations - such as Mariupol and Lysychansk - and from the immediate aftermath of February 24 three years ago, are still being verified due to the large number of reports, or cannot be verified due to lack of access to the relevant areas.
Friday's OHCHR report describes widespread violations of children's rights in the context of prolonged hostilities and occupation following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The extensive use of explosive weapons with wide area effects in populated areas has killed and injured children and damaged or destroyed homes, schools, medical facilities and electricity infrastructure. Ongoing fighting has disrupted essential services for children and triggered displacement.
As of December 2024, an estimated 737,000 children were internally displaced by the hostilities. Another 1.7 million were refugees, many of them separated from a parent, usually their father.
Large areas of Ukraine are now littered with landmines and explosive remnants of war, posing a long-term risk to children's lives and safety.
Children in areas of Ukraine occupied by Russian troops are particularly vulnerable, the report said. In the months following the invasion in particular, Russian forces committed widespread violence against civilians, including children.
The UN Human Rights Office also verified that in the first year after the invasion, at least 200 children, including many living in institutions, were transferred within occupied territory or to the Russian Federation - acts that may constitute war crimes.
However, without access to the Russian Federation or occupied territory, OHCHR was unable to fully assess the extent of these transfers.
On March 17, 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Russian presidential commissioner for children's rights, Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova. Both are accused of the war crime of unlawful deportation of children and unlawful transfer of children from occupied territory of Ukraine to Russia.
According to the OHCHR report, since annexing four regions of Ukraine - in violation of international law - in late 2022, Russian government authorities have made sweeping and profound changes to laws, institutions and governance there, directly affecting children and their human rights.
They have imposed Russian citizenship and the Russian school curriculum on Ukrainian children, while restricting any access to education in the Ukrainian language. They have prioritized military-patriotic training in schools and youth groups, exposing children to war propaganda.
OHCHR stressed that these changes violate international humanitarian law, which obliges the occupying power to protect children, respect their national identity and maintain the continuity of their education and culture.
“It is clear that Ukrainian children have endured a wide range of wartime experiences, all with serious impacts - some as refugees in Europe, others as direct victims, under continued threat of bombardment, and many subject to the coercive laws and policies of the Russian authorities in occupied areas,” the High Commissioner said.
“As our report makes clear, acknowledging and addressing violations are essential to ensure a future where all Ukrainian children can reclaim their rights, identity and security, free from the enduring consequences of war and occupation,” Türk added.
At least 1,614 attacks destroyed or damaged schools during the review period, according to the report. In response, Ukrainian authorities have implemented a wide range of measures, including requiring schools to have bomb shelters and to deliver classes online.
More than one-third of Ukrainian children now receive some or all of their schooling online. However, frequent air-raid alerts disrupt face-to-face instruction, and attacks by Russian forces on Ukraine's energy infrastructure have led to repeated power outages that disrupt or prevent online instruction, sometimes for extended periods of time.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on Friday that attacks over the past two days have had a devastating impact on children in Ukraine.
On Thursday, the Humanitarian Coordinator for Ukraine, Matthias Schmale, condemned an attack in the central Ukrainian city of Kropyvnytskyi in which children were among the many civilians injured. Residential buildings were also damaged.
Gruesome testimony of torture, rape and execution of Ukrainian civilians and soldiers
In another development concerning Ukraine this week, the UN Human Rights Council on Wednesday heard gruesome testimony of torture, rape and execution of Ukrainian detainees and soldiers allegedly committed by Russian forces, as the high-level independent inquiry into Russia's invasion delivered its latest mandated report in Geneva.
Enforced disappearances of civilians by Russian authorities were "widespread and systematic" and likely amounted to crimes against humanity, according to the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine.
“One of our important new findings is that Russian authorities committed enforced disappearances against Ukrainian civilians as crimes against humanity,” said Erik Møse, chairman of the panel, whose commissioners are neither UN employees nor paid for their work.
“Russian authorities detained large numbers of civilians in all provinces where they took control of areas in Ukraine. Victims included local authorities, civil servants, journalists, and other persons they perceived as a threat to their military objectives in Ukraine. Many prisoners of war were also victims of enforced disappearances.”
Møse added that many people have been missing for months or years, and some have died.
“The faith and whereabouts of many remain unknown, leaving their families in agonizing uncertainty,” he said.
Requests from families of missing persons to Russian authorities for information about their relatives are typically met with unhelpful replies, while one young man was “detained and beaten when he went to the authorities to enquire about his missing girlfriend”, the Commission noted.
As in previous presentations prepared for the Human Rights Council, the Commission’s latest report contains equally disturbing findings about the use of torture by Russian authorities.
The Commission investigated new cases of rape and sexual violence against female detainees. Some women were raped during interrogation as a means of coercion, intimidation or punishment; others were subjected to forced nudity in the presence of male guards.
“We have concluded that Russian authorities committed the war crimes of rape and sexual violence as a form of torture,” panel member Vrinda Grover told journalists in Geneva.
Grover noted that their findings confirmed that members of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) “exercised the highest authority. They committed or ordered torture at various stages of detention, and in particular during interrogations, when some of the most brutal treatment was inflicted”.
Asked about the focus on alleged human rights violations by Russian authorities in their latest report, the Commissioners noted that they had detailed alleged violations committed by the Ukrainian forces “whenever we have found [them]”.
“The Commission found that both parties to the armed conflict, using drones, killed or wounded visibly injured soldiers who could no longer defend themselves. This is a war crime,” Commission member Pablo de Greiff said.
“We documented some violations of human rights law committed by Ukrainian authorities against persons they accused of collaboration with Russian authorities. “
De Greiff also noted that despite more than 30 requests for information from Russian authorities about possible Ukrainian attacks, “we have received absolutely none” and pointed to evidence of reprisals against supposed collaborators working with the Russian authorities.
Another aspect of the independent rights investigators' report concerns a growing number of incidents in which Russian forces appear to have killed or wounded Ukrainian soldiers who were captured or attempting to surrender.
“This constitutes a war crime,” de Greiff said, relaying the testimony of a former soldier who alleged that “a deputy brigade commander told the entire regiment, quote, 'Prisoners are not needed, shoot them on the spot.”
February 24, 2025, marked three years since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which has left more than 42,000 civilians dead or injured. Humanitarian needs remain critical across the country, as lives and communities are devastated by attacks on civilian infrastructure.
Civilians remain at risk from relentless Russian attacks, particularly along the eastern and southern frontlines. Serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law, including war crimes and crimes against humanity, are widespread in the ongoing armed assault.
In 2025, 12.7 million people inside Ukraine are in need of humanitarian assistance. Despite ongoing international discussions on peace talks, the situation in Ukraine remains extremely volatile, with daily threats of shelling and airstrikes continuing to put lives at risk.
Russia escalated its conflict with Ukraine by invading the country on multiple fronts on February 24, 2022. The people of Ukraine continue to be killed, wounded, and deeply traumatized by the violence. The civilian infrastructure on which they depend continues to be destroyed or damaged.
The armed conflict has created the largest displacement crisis in Europe since World War II, with more than 10.6 million people still uprooted from their homes. As of February 2025, some 6.9 million people had been forced to flee abroad, mainly to the Russian Federation, Poland and Germany, and 3.7 million people were internally displaced.
Further information
Full text: The impact of the armed conflict and occupation on children’s rights in Ukraine (24 February 2022 – 31 December 2024), UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, report, published March 21, 2025
https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/2025-03/2025-03-21-ohchr-report-children-s-rights-in-ukraine.pdf
Full text: Report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, A/HRC/58/67, report, released March 19, 2025
https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/documents/hrbodies/hrcouncil/sessions-regular/session58/advance-version/a-hrc-58-67-auv-en.pdf