This conclusion was reached by the team of sociologists and analysts from “Active Group”, who from August 2024 to January 2025 studied how public life is changing in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, reports Polskie Radio.
The subject of the study was the adaptation of Ukrainians to life under russian occupation, mutual support, preservation of Ukrainian identity, consumption of Ukrainian information, and displays of civic activity under constant danger.
The level of threats in the occupied territories of Ukraine for residents remains high. They suffer from violent actions by the occupation authorities, economic issues, and a lack of basic resources, noted Oleksandr Pozniy, director of the research company “Active Group”.
According to him, people under russian occupation live in a state of constant fear. Arrests, violence, and disappearances are daily realities Ukrainians face in these territories. The general trend: people don’t know what will happen tomorrow, and can’t understand how to plan their lives going forward.
“People are often terrified to even move through the city because you never know if something will explode, or if you’ll be arrested for no reason, just because of a certain look, or a certain color. Or, for example, in Crimea, a family was arrested just because their place of birth was Lviv”, - said Pozniy.
He emphasized that “you could talk forever” about human rights violations in the occupied territories. People from there report housing confiscation, physical violence, persecution for pro-Ukrainian views. People are afraid of accidentally saying something pro-Ukrainian.
Despite the difficult conditions, most people have not lost their connection with Ukraine and want their regions to return under Kyiv’s control.
“The Ukrainian state must strengthen its support for citizens remaining in the occupied territories and provide them with information, legal protection, and resources for survival”, - concluded Yuliia Horbova, director of the Institute of Sociological Research at Kyiv National Economic University named after Vadym Hetman.