\nImagine that you wake up in the dead of night to find two men standing \nin your living room. “Who are you?”\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“I’m a burglar,” says the first man.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“I’m with the Red Cross,” says the second.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Are you helping him rob my house?” you ask, astounded.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“No, no, no,” he replies. “I’m neutral in this burglary.”\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Then what are you doing here?”\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“In case he hurts his back carrying out your stuff, I would provide medical assistance<\/a>.”\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \n“You call that `neutral?'” you ask, dumbfounded.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Well,” he replies, “If the burglar were to shoot you, I would try to stop the bleeding.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n \nIn their war with Russia, Ukrainians have come to look upon the \nInternational Committe of the Red Cross with some suspicion, and have \nbeen severely scolded for it.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nThe Red Cross has been accused of acting on concert with Russia to \nprovide aid and evacuations, to the long-term detriment of Ukrainian \ncivilians. The Red Cross has denied any wrong-doing<\/a>. They say it’s \nnot their policy to participate in forced evacuations<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nRemember, it is not the policy of the Russian army to commit war \ncrimes. Restating a policy in the face of an accusation can only \nsound creepy.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is not clear what choice people who are starving and brutalised have when a bus finally shows up, so `forced’ as a term loses its credibility in a denial. What the ICRC has conspicuously not done is deny acting as a front-end to forced evacuations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The main issue that must press on Ukrainians’ minds is the toxic environment inside Russia, which is illustrated by Russian propaganda, and the mistreatment of Ukrainian civilians by Russian soldiers. To an outside observer, evacuating civilians to the very country that is bent on destroying them is a non-starter. If you were to rescue Uyghurs from a concentration camp in Xinjiang, would you evacuate them to China? Regardless of what actually happens to them, would you be willing to take the responsibility for sending them there? <\/p>\n\n\n\n So, what is actually happening to Ukrainian refugees? The refugee camps in Russian-controlled territory are more rightly called filtration camps, and by some inmates as concentration camps<\/a>. There is plenty of reason to believe that forced deportations are taking place<\/a>. Ironically, a report<\/a> has surfaced of a Red Cross volunteer being forcibly deported and heavily beaten. Furthermore, there are reports that Ukrainians are being sent to Siberia<\/a>. There are reports<\/a> of Ukrainian children being sent 6000 km to the Pacific coast, where they are forced to learn Russian. This is consistent with a long-standing practice of sending Ukrainian refugees to remote and under-populated regions<\/a>, with no means of return<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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