CURRENTTIME — broadcast
20260806 020000 UTC
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[00:00:26] Your call will be answered by the first available operator. While abroad,
[00:00:30] trying to determine the fate of their real estate and regain ownership,
[00:00:34] Ekaterina and Valeriy call the Russian
[00:00:38] occupation zone. "What country are you a citizen of?"
[00:00:40] "Ukraine."
[00:00:44] It's difficult here, of course. On the other end of the line is an official
[00:00:47] from the Rosreestr branch, a state body that records
[00:00:51] real estate in Russia. This is how Valeriy is answered regarding new
[00:00:55] tenants in his family's apartment. "These are military personnel. If
[00:00:58] they're military, well, then there's nothing you can do." Conducting an investigation
[00:01:02] into public and non-public actions by Russian authorities in the occupied
[00:01:06] territories of Ukraine, we counted at least six
[00:01:09] schemes by which property is illegally seized, in violation of international conventions,
[00:01:13] from those who rightfully owned it. What
[00:01:17] are these schemes? How do they work? Who is
[00:01:19] involved? Based on facts from primary sources—decisions,
[00:01:23] orders, documents, decrees from the Kremlin—we will show the scale
[00:01:26] of what is happening, and explain how the seizure of apartments, houses, and plots
[00:01:31] of land, theft, and looting in the captured territories
[00:01:34] became
[00:01:35] systematic.
[00:01:38] Valeriy's mother, he himself, and his brother Vitaliy are natives of the Luhansk
[00:01:42] region of Ukraine. The city of Severodonetsk was occupied
[00:01:45] twice: first in 2014, the occupation
[00:01:48] lasted two and a half months, then a new
[00:01:51] occupation from June 2022.
[00:01:55] They fled the war as a whole family. There are so many
[00:01:58] graves near the entrance.
[00:02:00] People were buried right next to their
[00:02:03] homes, directly in the
[00:02:05] gardens. This is a terrible
[00:02:09] situation. In 2022, during the capture of the city by Russian
[00:02:12] troops, 90% of the housing stock in Severodonetsk was damaged or destroyed.
[00:02:16] This information is confirmed by international
[00:02:19] organizations. About thirty multi-story buildings cannot
[00:02:22] be restored. The Olenchek family's apartment miraculously
[00:02:25] survived. "This is my childhood apartment, for me, for my
[00:02:28] brother. I was brought here from the maternity hospital." That same
[00:02:32] photograph, taken in the apartment, when Valeriy was brought from the maternity hospital in
[00:02:36] 1972. And this is a little later, during
[00:02:40] a walk near the house in a baby carriage. And this photo
[00:02:43] was taken in March 1990 at the Severodonetsk House of Culture.
[00:02:47] Valeriy did ballroom dancing as a child. Here are the brothers,
[00:02:51] still preschoolers, with their father. Their mother took the photo in
[00:02:54] that very apartment. "Well, this is not just our apartment, it's our
[00:02:58] place of power before... Naimushtabka just
[00:03:01] renovated it for mom, put in new furniture.
[00:03:04] Yes,
[00:03:07] and I think it will be a surprise for her when she
[00:03:10] comes there again. It wasn't meant to be.
[00:03:14] It was a horror. My aunt, when she was
[00:03:17] there, said, "Let me at least see. Katya has a good
[00:03:20] piano with silver strings." Valeriy used to play
[00:03:24] it there. "No, we're cutting herring
[00:03:28] on it there already."
[00:04:02] you need to get a special permit for
[00:04:05] registration from the collegial body. And
[00:04:09] if such a permit is issued, then Ukrainian citizens
[00:04:12] are told: "You need to come here." Those who fled
[00:04:16] the Russian occupation call this blackmail and abuse. They are
[00:04:19] required to return to the captured territories
[00:04:22] in person. Human rights activists consider this a trap, because
[00:04:26] their arrival could lead to interrogations and even imprisonment.
[00:04:30] "You have to go through the only FSB filtration zone,
[00:04:33] and it's located at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport."
[00:04:36] "Will they let me through with a Ukrainian passport?" "I can't tell you that. It
[00:04:39] all depends on the border, on who it
[00:04:43] depends on. Sometimes it happens, sometimes it depends on the border,
[00:04:47] sometimes it happens that a person gets permission, comes here,
[00:04:50] but they're not let through at Sheremetyevo. Nobody is immune to that. You're
[00:04:54] given permission to register, not to
[00:04:58] travel here." Two decrees, issued in the Kremlin under
[00:05:01] Putin's signature, one numbered 1103 in December
[00:05:05] 2024, the other 145 in March
[00:05:09] 2025. Both concern the captured
[00:05:50] and some of them still have property. So,
[00:05:53] accordingly, if they don't register Russian citizenship, they
[00:05:57] lose it. That is, everything is taken from them.
[00:06:01] Roughly, absolutely, with the police, with the police, right?
[00:06:04] They just kick them out of their apartments and houses, right?
[00:06:08] Even though they lived there for 20, 30, 50 years, right?
[00:06:12] There's another much larger group,
[00:06:16] those who fled, who are now scattered across
[00:06:19] the world. But in order for them
[00:06:22] to register this property, they need
[00:06:26] to come in person first, to the same Mariupol,
[00:06:30] and personally first get Russian
[00:06:33] citizenship, and then go to Rosimushchestvo and deal with all this
[00:06:37] business. How can they get there now? Only through
[00:06:39] Sheremetyevo, where they are met by whom?
[00:06:42] FSB agents. Since October 2023,
[00:06:46] Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport has become virtually the only checkpoint,
[00:06:50] a filtration hub for Ukrainian citizens who
[00:06:53] expect to reach the occupied territories to their relatives, loved ones, or
[00:06:57] simply return home. A good friend of
[00:07:00] mine, he tried to return to Mariupol with his family, with the sole purpose of
[00:07:04] registering his property so that it wouldn't be
[00:07:07] taken away from him. And
[00:07:10] he told me that for three days, the FSB officers held him
[00:07:13] at Sheremetyevo. Besides him, there
[00:07:17] were about 30 other people from Berdyansk,
[00:07:20] Melitopol, Donetsk, Makiyivka, well, Mariupol, right,
[00:07:24] and from Lysychansk, I think, right?
[00:07:27] Very different people, old and young, whoever,
[00:07:31] right? They refused everyone,
[00:07:34] absolutely, and the attitude towards them was absolutely brutal. So, how
[00:07:38] is property taken from those who owned it before the arrival of Russian
[00:07:41] troops? What schemes and mechanisms of property seizure
[00:07:45] are being used by the Russian authorities in the occupied territories at
[00:07:49] present? Scheme number one:
[00:07:52] nullification of property rights, nationalization. Local
[00:07:56] authorities, appointed by the Kremlin, compile lists of real estate
[00:07:59] objects and make decisions on their seizure. All this
[00:08:02] is formalized in the form of local laws and decrees. Scheme
[00:08:06] number two: the introduction of a bureaucratic procedure in the occupied
[00:08:09] territories, the so-called re-registration of property
[00:08:12] rights, meaning the creation of legal barriers for those who cannot
[00:08:16] undergo this re-registration. This requires personal
[00:08:20] presence and mandatory adoption of Russian
[00:08:22] citizenship. The third scheme: housing is declared
[00:08:26] ownerless, after which it is sold off.
[00:08:29] The fourth and fifth schemes of property seizure:
[00:08:32] prohibition of state registration of rights of Ukrainian owners as
[00:08:36] citizens of unfriendly states, restrictions on
[00:08:39] notarization of powers of attorney for real estate transactions. And
[00:08:43] finally, the sixth scheme: initiation of criminal cases under
[00:08:46] articles related, for example, to accusations of extremism, and as
[00:08:50] a final step, judicial confiscation of personal property. The first
[00:08:54] signs were back in Crimea after the annexation,
[00:08:57] right, when it also started
[00:08:59] that those who didn't re-register
[00:09:03] through Russian citizenship, all of this was taken from them. Ukrainian historian
[00:09:07] Marusov, whose public activity was previously closely linked to
[00:09:10] the preservation of cultural heritage in Mariupol, now acts
[00:09:14] as an expert on the restoration of Ukrainian cities and studies
[00:09:18] the situation in the occupied territories. What then happened to
[00:09:21] this property? It was given to Russian military personnel,
[00:09:24] Russian security forces, and collaborators,
[00:09:28] right, well, that is,
[00:09:30] obviously, or to those who came, right,
[00:09:34] from mainland Russia, right, they got jobs
[00:09:37] and so on and so forth, right? That is, the goal
[00:09:41] is obvious, it's simply
[00:09:42] the displacement of
[00:09:45] the Ukrainian population. From the first day of Russian occupation,
[00:09:48] they pursue two policies: the policy of population replacement and the policy
[00:09:52] of marginalization. That is, the point is that if Ukrainians
[00:09:55] remain there, they must be marginalized to such an extent
[00:09:59] that they cannot resist, right?
[00:10:02] They do not operate, as we say, and
[00:10:05] they are quite successful here. Russians are making progress
[00:10:09] here because they objectively believe that two Ukrainians together
[00:10:12] means there will be a revolution. Well, this is the
[00:10:15] opinion, not groundless,
[00:10:17] so it needs to be diluted, and therefore
[00:10:21] such replacement is happening. Here again, it's not happening everywhere.
[00:10:25] Let's look at the truth, right? That is, it's not successful everywhere. They settled
[00:10:28] Lugansk region, for example, but for some reason, no one goes there, no one goes to
[00:10:32] Donetsk, except for the Buryats, these military personnel. Well,
[00:10:36] because those are, as it were, depressed regions, essentially.
[00:10:39] Petr Andryushchenko previously worked as an advisor to the mayor of Mariupol.
[00:10:43] Now his specialization, as he says, is monitoring the situation in
[00:10:47] the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. The problem
[00:10:50] is,
[00:10:52] in Mariupol, for example,
[00:10:55] the occupancy of hospitals, medical personnel of any
[00:10:58] specialty, right? If you look at the types, nurses,
[00:11:02] nannies, junior staff, mid-level staff of doctors,
[00:11:05] the maximum occupancy is 35%.
[00:11:08] 65% needs to be found somewhere. Where to find them? They can only be found in
[00:11:12] Russia, well, in some form. They refuse to go, even for
[00:11:15] double salary. They don't go. But they see
[00:11:19] that students after university go if they are given apartments
[00:11:23] for free. Leaving,
[00:11:31] we didn't think we were saying goodbye to our home forever. We didn't
[00:11:35] say goodbye to it because we believed
[00:11:38] that we would return
[00:11:40] and live on. In this family,
[00:11:44] the war unleashed by the Kremlin separated relatives.
[00:11:47] Elderly parents in February 2022
[00:11:50] were unable to flee, letting their children and grandchildren go, they remained in the territory
[00:11:53] captured by Russia. Fearing for the safety of this family, we do not name
[00:11:57] names or specify the occupied city.
[00:12:01] At that time, we had a non-transportable
[00:12:04] grandmother, unfortunately, she has already passed away,
[00:12:08] so my parents initially had
[00:12:12] no possibility to leave, as they could not abandon grandmother, right?
[00:12:16] And then there were attempts, but due to
[00:12:19] a certain situation, with FSB
[00:12:22] checks, these attempts did not
[00:12:25] succeed. That is, as this native resident of one of
[00:12:29] the Ukrainian cities occupied by Russia says, her parents are
[00:12:32] essentially hostages. Russian FSB officers
[00:12:36] decide who to let go, who not from the occupied territories.
[00:12:40] Facts of restrictions on the freedom of movement of the civilian population are confirmed by
[00:12:44] international human rights organizations. This
[00:12:47] is recorded in the documents of the United Nations Security
[00:12:49] Council. According to reliable reports
[00:12:53] received by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human
[00:12:56] Rights, this practice has led to numerous human rights violations,
[00:13:00] including the rights to freedom, personal integrity, and
[00:13:04] privacy. From the transcript of the UN Security
[00:13:07] Council meeting on September 7,
[00:13:10] 202. Well, those who couldn't
[00:13:13] leave before the occupation began share information with their relatives and loved ones
[00:13:17] about how property rights are violated in the territories
[00:13:20] controlled by the Kremlin. Well, look,
[00:13:24] an example of my friend. He was Belarusian, bought a hotel in
[00:13:27] Crimea. In 2014,
[00:13:31] the last time we contacted him,
[00:13:34] he
[00:13:36] calls and says, "Some Caucasian
[00:13:39] people came to me, some Cossacks,
[00:13:43] and asked for my documents for
[00:13:46] the hotel." He says, "I gave them
[00:13:49] the documents, naturally Ukrainian. They tore them up
[00:13:53] in front of his eyes and said, 'Are there
[00:13:56] any more documents?'" He says, "No, there aren't any others."
[00:14:00] They say, "Well, tomorrow you're out with your suitcases." Another scheme
[00:14:03] of property seizure after Russia's capture of Ukrainian
[00:14:06] cities, already targeting those who remain under occupation. The
[00:14:10] DPR authorities made us homeless. They demolished our houses,
[00:14:14] annulled addresses. Kremlin-controlled authorities
[00:14:17] declare homes unfit for habitation, people are evicted,
[00:14:21] buildings are demolished, and new multi-story buildings are built in their place.
[00:14:25] But already for sale. "I lived in this apartment for 20 years.
[00:14:28] I received this apartment for my own house. Please explain
[00:14:32] to us, Mariupol residents, why everyone needs
[00:14:35] Mariupol, but no one needs us, the residents of Mariupol,
[00:14:38] who suffered during the hostilities. There are 1800 of us
[00:14:42] homeless people, we have nowhere to live." Before
[00:14:45] the eviction and demolition of houses, all these people, as they say,
[00:14:49] Russian authorities promised to provide ownership of housing in
[00:14:52] newly built houses, but then...
[00:16:07] that the apartments provided to them are not entirely
[00:16:11] legitimate even from the Russian point of view,
[00:16:14] that's why some semblance
[00:16:17] of legitimacy was required for the
[00:16:21] banditry that the occupying
[00:16:25] authorities were carrying out in these
[00:16:28] territories. Putin, all he did was, as it were,
[00:16:31] formalize this banditry, this robbery; he
[00:16:35] simply formalized it as a law. And this is what a document directly
[00:16:39] related to property confiscation looks like. State seal
[00:16:42] explanation: the property is municipal
[00:16:46] property, sealed. Unauthorized entry
[00:16:49] entails liability in accordance with the Criminal Code of the Russian
[00:16:53] Federation. May 2026,
[00:16:56] footage from a surveillance camera from the entrance of a multi-story
[00:17:00] building in Mariupol. According to the Telegram channel
[00:17:04] Andryushchenko Time, an official from the city administration on...
[00:17:20] apartments and houses and land plots, including those for
[00:17:23] which people have already processed all the documents, which are already
[00:17:27] officially in the registries of this Rosimushchestvo
[00:17:31] and so on, right? They were again there. Moreover, these
[00:17:34] officials, they started coming
[00:17:38] and hanging on
[00:17:41] the doors
[00:17:43] notifications
[00:17:45] that your property has all
[00:17:49] the signs of being ownerless. If
[00:17:52] you don't bring documents
[00:17:55] within a few days, right, and don't register it,
[00:17:58] then it will be recognized as ownerless. It
[00:18:02] will become the property, so to speak, of the Russian
[00:18:04] state.
[00:18:06] My friend's mother used to come home, making
[00:18:10] it seem like someone lived there, hanging laundry from
[00:18:13] the balcony, for example, sometimes turning on the light,
[00:18:17] creating some activity. Still,
[00:18:20] they would come and check the meters. If it hadn't registered
[00:18:23] some minimum, they understood that the apartment was still
[00:18:27] empty. They would go in
[00:18:31] and let
[00:18:33] anyone who wanted to live there. Now, about how Russian authorities explain
[00:18:37] the confiscation of property in the occupied territories. In
[00:18:41] late 2025, when passing the law, the State Duma
[00:18:44] explained that a legal basis was needed to provide housing to citizens
[00:18:48] if they lost their homes due to hostilities.
[00:18:50] Housing is deemed ownerless if there are no
[00:18:54] valid title documents for it, or if
[00:18:57] the owner cannot be identified. An object is recognized as ownerless based on
[00:19:01] inventory data from registration authorities and inspection
[00:19:04] reports. We studied published documents of local
[00:19:08] officials who implement decisions made in
[00:19:10] Moscow. In only one Ukrainian city under occupation,
[00:19:14] Mariupol, over 10,000 apartments
[00:19:17] were listed as ownerless. Those
[00:19:21] who continue to live in this city captured by Russia complain
[00:19:24] and are bewildered. "We've had three mayors under Russia,
[00:19:28] and now we seem to have our third mayor in the city.
[00:19:32] For some reason, the second one seems to be in prison
[00:19:35] for some reason. The third one,
[00:19:38] in sequential order, has not yet resolved
[00:19:41] the housing issue for people. I understand.
[00:19:45] Give people back their apartments." And this is a resident of Mariupol,
[00:19:48] Lyudmila, talking about how she lost her right to her
[00:19:52] property. "We were told that our documents were simply lost, that
[00:19:55] is, they are gone. But I think it was done
[00:19:58] intentionally, just to, well, specifically to deprive many
[00:20:02] people of their homes altogether, their own homes,
[00:20:04] moreover, well..."
[00:20:37] but also commercial properties, like some former stores, shopping
[00:20:41] centers, other buildings, warehouses. It would
[00:20:45] be strange if they weren't handed over to new, so to speak,
[00:20:48] feudal signs. Kickbacks
[00:21:31] and corruption for all other things, but in
[00:21:33] general, there was no normal economy, no
[00:21:37] economic prosperity, no investments, no real
[00:21:40] restoration of these territories, there wasn't, isn't, and won't be. Now, about the scale
[00:21:44] of what is happening, this is the text of the transcript from the Russian
[00:21:47] federal government from August 26th. In the Kremlin
[00:21:58] territories in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and
[00:22:01] Zaporizhzhia regions. We have registered and entered
[00:22:05] 4,600 objects based on the inventory,
[00:22:08] Mikhail Vladimirovich, that's about 80%.
[00:22:12] By real estate objects, you mean both land
[00:22:15] plots, and buildings, structures, and objects firmly
[00:22:18] connected to the land, that is.
[00:22:51] he was killed, and the farm was taken away. Many
[00:22:54] of those I
[00:22:57] interview in our sociological
[00:23:01] studies draw parallels with events a hundred years
[00:23:05] ago. They say that now we understand how
[00:23:08] the Bolsheviks came to power, by what
[00:23:11] methods they established their occupation regime in
[00:23:14] Ukraine back then in 1918-1920,
[00:23:17] how repressions happened.
[00:23:20] of the thirties, thirty- three, thirty-seven.
[00:23:23] And practically everyone who
[00:23:27] leaves, they recall
[00:23:30] these very events in their interviews,
[00:23:34] and draw direct parallels that everything
[00:23:37] that is happening in the occupied territories is a
[00:23:41] repetition of the Bolshevik experience of a hundred years ago.
[00:23:44] International human rights organizations classify the actions of the Russian
[00:23:48] authorities as massive... preserve
[00:24:00] documents and record facts of property rights violations.
[00:24:04] All of this, according to him, will be needed for appeals to
[00:24:08] courts after the war ends. Russia will have to pay
[00:24:11] reparations to Ukraine for destroyed
[00:24:14] cities, captured
[00:24:17] apartments. Human rights activists and lawyers recommend
[00:24:20] preserving Ukrainian documents for real estate, photos of
[00:24:23] apartments, houses, plots, receipts, and
[00:24:26] statements related to this real estate, screenshots
[00:24:29] of lists of ownerless property, photos
[00:24:32] of notifications on doors, as well as evidence of impossibility
[00:24:35] of entry or risk of filtration. The Register of Damage
[00:24:38] caused to Ukraine as a result of the Russian armed
[00:24:41] invasion, created under the Council of Europe in May
[00:24:44] 2023, already provides for claims for
[00:24:47] damage or destruction of housing, as well as for loss of access or
[00:24:51] control over real estate in temporarily occupied territories.
[00:24:55] I think huge collective lawsuits will be filed against the Russian authorities
[00:24:59] for seized, occupied territories, destroyed
[00:25:02] property. And I think that in international
[00:25:04] courts, all chances, so to
[00:25:08] speak, of winning these cases will be, let's say, with
[00:25:12] Ukrainian citizens whose property was taken away or destroyed. Well,
[00:25:15] next is the question of how, which Russian assets, who will freeze where? Freezing
[00:25:18] Russian state corporations, some state banks, state monopolies, everything else,
[00:25:22] or will it be some kind of, figuratively speaking, a reparation fund
[00:25:26] created, replenished, which will be replenished by
[00:25:29] such a duty,
[00:25:33] a certain tax on the export of Russian goods? That is, figuratively speaking, from every
[00:25:37] barrel of oil, 5-10 dollars will immediately go into this reparation
[00:25:40] fund for the payment of, accordingly,
[00:25:44] reparations to the captured citizens of Ukraine who suffered
[00:25:48] losses there in... Russian
[00:26:03] authorities immediately cancel procedures that lead to
[00:26:06] property confiscation and discrimination in the captured
[00:26:09] territories. All of the Kremlin's decisions on property re-registration
[00:26:12] in the territories captured by Russia, as the Ukrainian authorities declare, will be
[00:26:16] legally null and void immediately after the end of the occupation. This is what
[00:26:20] those whose apartments are now in the Russian-occupied
[00:26:23] cities hope for. "Everyone who now moves into
[00:26:26] another Mariupol resident's apartment becomes
[00:26:29] part of a war crime. He becomes not just
[00:26:32] a criminal, he becomes an accomplice
[00:26:35] in war crimes, in all of this that is happening. Therefore, for
[00:26:39] us, this is an absolutely legitimate military target.
[00:26:42] It would be good to remember this, regardless of gender,
[00:26:46] age, and so on. Well, we just have the right to do
[00:26:49] that. And I will say that
[00:26:52] having talked a lot with our people from the occupied territories, not
[00:26:55] only from Mariupol, this applies to everyone. We are
[00:26:59] enough and of different ages to..."
[00:27:32] there will be happiness. They
[00:27:35] will be cursed and are already cursed,
[00:27:39] and it will not bring them any benefit, no health, no
[00:27:42] happiness. I don't know, everyone should decide
[00:27:46] for themselves according to their
[00:27:49] own considerations, upbringing.
[00:27:53] But nothing good will come of it. You cannot
[00:27:56] build your happiness on someone else's misfortune. Ekaterina, Valeriy,
[00:28:00] and Vitaliy say to follow the instruction.
[00:28:32] there will be no other chance anyway. They still, well, there won't be happiness
[00:28:36] in that apartment. According to international
[00:28:39] human rights organizations, as of today, hundreds of
[00:28:43] thousands of Ukrainian citizens have had their property rights violated
[00:28:46] by Russia after the armed invasion.
[00:28:53] Novikov, Current
[00:28:54] Time.
[00:29:42] It was a real threat. There are
[00:29:45] criteria for launch. If they are violated, the launch
[00:29:49] will be canceled. Problems with hydrogen leaks happened
[00:29:53] during the Shuttle era, and we successfully resolved them. In the situation with
[00:29:57] Artemis and the SLS rocket, it is important to remember that
[00:30:00] this was the very first time these systems
[00:30:03] interacted as a single unit.
[00:30:46] success.
[00:30:50] Cars versus bicycles. Berlin discusses urban mobility
[00:30:54] plans.
[00:30:59] Cable car.