More than a Third of Those who have Disappeared during Putin’s Expanded War in Ukraine Likely Still Alive, Memory Project Lawyer Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 29 – No one knows the precise number of those who have disappeared for one reason or another during Putin’s expanded war in Ukraine, Grigor Avetisyan says. The conflict is still in its “hot” phase, and the Russian side, as opposed to the Ukrainian one, has been extremely chary in releasing any data.

              But the experience of past wars suggests that a third or slightly more are still alive; and the dramatic expansion of the use of videos in war zones means that there is a greater chance to identify what has happened to those listed as missing or disappeared, the lawyer for the Memory Project says (cherta.media/interview/kuda-ischezayut-lyudi-na-vojne/).

            Moreover, because there is no statute of limitations on illegal killings or the or  hiding of information about such actions, Avetisyan says, the countries involved and the international community must continue to press for information about such disappearances while the conflict is going on and for as long afterwards as needed – a likely political landmine.

            The legal expert notes that people in all societies disappear all the time, but during wars, the ways in which this can happen increase as do the number of people involved. In conflicts, people disappear because some of those killed can’t be identified, some are in jail, some have fled or defected to the other side, and some have been killed by their own forces.

            Identifying all disappearances will be difficult, Aventisiyan says, but far less so now because there is so much video recording. Consequently, it is likely that after the hot phase of Putin’s war, far larger shares of those listed as missing or disappeared will in fact be identified unless the governments involved work to block that from happening.