You have to close your eyes and imagine the scene, since journalists are not free to go to Russian-occupied Donbas. Picture a large U-shaped table in the center of a meeting room inside an administrative building in the suburbs of Luhansk (or Lugansk, in Russian). The president of the administrative commission "in charge of minors' affairs and the protection of their rights" for the district stood behind a lectern. Around the table, 14 other officials each had a microphone, including, at the end of the table, a lively 43-year-old lawyer and her daughter, a 15-year-old high school student.

Police officers had knocked on their door to notify them of the appointment: Tuesday, April 22, 2025, at 2 pm, on Lenin Street. "The district commission for juvenile affairs (...) regarding the review of the report from secondary school no. x (...) concerning the violation of the minor's rights to education and instruction by her mother (...) will examine the report in a public session (...)." The mother was accused of not raising her daughter in the patriotic spirit of Russia, their new country. The evidence? Her daughter's insolence and repeated absences during the weekly class called "Conversations About the Essentials," a kind of Putinist catechism established in 2022 in all schools in the Russian Federation, where the "special operation" in Ukraine and traditional Russian values are glorified.

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