Roundtable The Demography of War

Roundtable “The Demography of War – Russian Ideology and the Forced Deportation of Ukrainian Children” in Brussels

On 8 July, Mark Laity from PR Army participated in a roundtable “The Demography of War – Russian Ideology and the Forced Deportation of Ukrainian Children”. Hosted by the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies, the event focused on one of the most egregious war crimes committed during Russia's invasion of Ukraine: the forced deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, Belarus, and the temporarily occupied territories.

The panel featured:
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Mark Laity, Adviser to PR Army, Founder of the StratCom Academy, and former Head of NATO StratCom
‍Tomi Huhtanen, Executive Director of the Martens Centre
Tamila Tasheva, Member of the Ukrainian Parliament

The discussion was moderated by Vít Novotný, Senior Research Officer at the Martens Centre.

The discussion focused on the strategic reasoning behind Russia’s war crimes, illustrating how child abductions, deportations, and cultural erasure serve as tools of demographic warfare and ideological domination.

🗨️ Mark Laity:

“So why are they doing it? Control. Depopulation of areas they take over, extermination and movement of dissidents, and then repopulation. It is a war crime – and not enough emphasis is put on that. This is a demonstrable historical policy. So whenever they talk about doing a deal – there is no deal to be done. And it’s also proof of their aim to reinvigorate the Soviet Empire.”

“Putin recently said, ‘Wherever a Russian soldier puts his foot – that is ours.’ What this shows is evil intent, and it dictates our response. We’ve got to stop thinking that we can do a deal about this. There is only one deal to be made: Russia has got to lose.”

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🗨️ Tamila Tasheva:

“When we talk about the forced deportation of Ukrainian kids, it is not a new tactic deployed by Russia – it started in Crimea in 2014. Many atrocities and war crimes that Russia now commits in newly occupied regions like Kherson and Zaporizhia, they first practised in Crimea. Their atrocities playbook includes forced disappearances, kidnapping and adoption of children, killing and persecution of activists, torture. They tested those methods in Crimea and are now deploying them across other captured territories.”

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🎥 Watch the full event here

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