Russia is conducting a large-scale russification of the Ukrainian territories it has occupied. This is what it looks like:

◾️ Forced passportization
In April 2023, Russia passed a law according to which the residents of the occupied territories must obtain Russian citizenship by July 2024, otherwise they can be deported.

The occupation authorities have created a system in which the receipt of basic services such as access to food, education, work, healthcare and life-saving medicines, as well as pensions or property, depends on having a Russian passport.

◾️ Military mobilization
A Russian passport is also a "ticket to war" for men. About 80,000 residents of Luhansk and Donetsk regions have been forced to fight against Ukraine. According to refugees who managed to flee from occupied parts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, the occupation military commissions there are also beginning to draft men.

◾️ Censorship and propaganda
The Russian Federation is trying to control access to information for residents of the occupied territories. Broadcasting of Ukrainian television channels and radio stations has been stopped in the occupied towns and villages and access to Internet has been restricted. Cell phones and computers are constantly checked.

In schools, textbooks with sections on the "special military operation" are used to try to convince future conscripts to "go to war". Schoolchildren are forced to join Young Army Cadets National Movement and parents are forced to send their children to cadet classes.

◾️ Torture
The UN Independent International Commission reported on the systematic use of torture by Russians in the occupied territories in its report of October 2023. Leonid Remyha, the head doctor of Kherson City Hospital, who himself went through torture, said that people were beaten with sticks on their knees, fingers, hands and ribs in pre-trial detention centers. There are thousands of such testimonies.