Obedinski’s mother died when she was a baby. Her father, Eugene Obedinsky, a former captain of Ukraine’s national water polo team, was shot and killed as Russian forces made their way to the southeastern city of Mariupol on March 17th.
Days later, Kira and her father’s friend tried to flee the city on foot with neighbors. But after being injured in a mine blast, Kira was taken to a hospital in the Donetsk region, which is controlled by Moscow-backed separatists.
Now Kira’s grandfather, Alexander, fears he will never see her again. He said an official from the breakaway government in Donetsk called and invited him to go there to pick her up, which is impossible due to the war.
He says he spoke to the hospital and was told that Kira would eventually be sent to an orphanage in Russia.
The Russian government has said it has helped move at least 60,000 Ukrainians safely across the Russian border. The Ukrainian government said about 40,000 had been relocated against their will, describing it as abduction and forced deportation.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees said more than 433,000 Ukrainian refugees had arrived in Russia since February 24, when Russian forces invaded Ukraine.
Ukrainian officials say thousands have been forcibly deported to Russian territory after Russian troops blocked safe passage into Ukrainian territory and relocated evacuees against their will to remote parts of Russia.
Speaking to CNN, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky accused Russia of forcing people fleeing Mariupol to Russia.
“Several thousand, tens of thousands were forced to evacuate in the direction of the Russian Federation and we do not know where they are, they have not left a trace of documents,” the president told CNN.
“And there are several thousand children among them, we want to know what happened to them. Are they in good health. Unfortunately, there is simply no information about that.”
Moscow has denounced allegations of forced deportations as lies, claiming that Ukraine has thwarted its efforts to “evacuate” people to Russia.
But CNN spoke to a number of Ukrainians who said they were given only two options: to go to Russia or to die. In interviews with 10 people, including Mariupol locals and their relatives, many described Russian and DNR soldiers descending on bomb shelters and ordering those inside to leave immediately.
No one knew where they were being taken. Eventually, five were sent to Russia; three have since succeeded.
Ukrainian and US officials and independent human rights monitors also claim that Russian and separatist forces are treating tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians through so-called “filtration camps,” where they are biometrically checked and their phones and documents confiscated before being sent to Russia.
Alexander said the Russians had also confiscated Kira’s documents and said new ones would be provided to her in Russia.
Russian media, which have repeatedly downplayed the brutality of the conflict in Ukraine, showed a video of Kira happily telling how she was sometimes allowed to call her grandfather.
This is “proof” that she was not abducted, according to a Russian TV presenter, who called the allegation another “Ukrainian forgery”.
Meanwhile, Alexander received an audio message from Kira telling him not to cry. But the young girl, who lost her family, her freedom and her home in Russia’s war, cannot stop her own tears.
“I haven’t seen you in so long,” she says. “I want to cry.”
CNN’s Nathan Hodge, Julia Kesaeva, Eliza Mackintosh, Alexandra Ochman, Gianluca Metzofiore, Katie Polglas, Thiel Rebain, Anastasia Graham-Yul and Amy Cassidy contributed to this report.
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