On July 18, a number of Moldovan media outlets distributed a statement from the local Reintegration Bureau, expressing concern about children from the Transnistrian region in summer camps organized in Russia and in occupied Crimea. As the Bureau recalled, in the current conditions, such practices indicate the irresponsibility of both parents and teachers.
“It is regrettable that the safety of children is at stake,” the institution emphasized to TV8. In addition to the threat to security, the authorities note that such events contain re-education practices, during which harmful attitudes and anti-political values are imposed on children.
“Children should not and cannot become the object of such influences,” the Bureau concluded.
Earlier, the Promo-LEX Association reported that dozens of children from the Transnistrian region have been spending their summer holidays in the Artek camp in occupied Crimea for almost ten years. 2025 was no exception – these days, children from Bendery participated in the “celebration of the camp’s centenary”.
The human rights organization condemned these provocations and strongly recommended that the Moldovan authorities regularly record the actions of both the Tiraspol regime and Russia regarding the militarization of children’s education.
The Association indicated that the vouchers to “Artek” for Transnistrian children were issued by the “Russian Institute for Strategic Studies” and the “Association of Russian Schools Abroad” based on the results of “patriotic” competitions.
It is reported that on June 12, these children met with Yuri Nimchenko, a former tank driver and “senator” from occupied Crimea, and with TV presenter Ekaterina Andreeva, who has become one of the faces of Russian propaganda.
“Promo-LEX” writes that this has become “one of the many instruments of indoctrination and militarization of minors with the aim of tying them to Russia and its occupation regimes…. the goals of these camps and the activities carried out in them fundamentally contradict the principles of democracy and human rights.”
