“I Want to Find” unified center for searching for russian servicemen to launch in Ukraine

The project “I Want to Find” is being launched within the framework of the initiatives of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War. Citizens of the russian federation can turn to the new center to get official, unbiased information about their relatives who ended up in the aggressor’s army on the territory of Ukraine.

This was discussed during a briefing at Media Center Ukraine – Ukrinform.

In particular, there will be a chatbot in Telegram for those russians who are looking for information about their relatives. After a corresponding request the chatbot will search the available databases and provide information about the person, for example, whether they may be in captivity, missing or dead.

“Relatives of the soldiers of the aggressor army have turned and are turning to us for information to search for their relatives, to find out whether they are alive or perhaps in captivity. Because russia really does not properly provide information to its own citizens about what is happening to their military personnel on the territory of Ukraine. Hundreds of people contact us every day through the channels of “I Want to Live” project, so it was decided to launch “I Want to Find” project as a unified center for searching for the russian servicemen, so that relevant information could be provided to their families, and they could already go with this information to representatives of their authorities and demand exchanges, if the person is in captivity. And if the person is dead – the return of their remains,” Vitalii Matviienko explained.

He also noted that with the launch of the project, several thousand appeals from russian citizens are expected to come in weekly.

“After russian citizens receive information about their military, it’s not that they can – they must go to their authorities and demand at least a corresponding status and actual exchanges. Therefore, in addition to the humanitarian mission of this project, it is also important for Ukraine and Ukrainians,” he added.

In turn, “Nash Vykhod” (Our Exit), russian civic movement for the search and return of military personnel of the russian federation, took up the initiative to help the relatives of russian military personnel get in touch with “I Want to Find” project.

“We will collect requests. If there is a positive answer, for example, that a person’s relative is in captivity in Ukraine, they can sign up for a consultation in our movement, and we will organize a video call with them in order to confirm and give the russians the opportunity to go to the authorities. Based on this video call proving that their relative is really in captivity they can demand an exchange. In other words, we provide the tools for the russian women to initiate demands,” said Irina Krynina, a citizen of the russian federation and co-founder of the civic movement for the search and return of russian army soldiers “Nash Vykhod.”

Read more: https://mediacenter.org.ua/news