‘Stop the war! Stop Russia!’ — Ukrainians in Cape Town

Ukrainians living in Cape Town marked the fourth anniversary of Russia’s invasion of their country with a protest against Russia – but only after resisting police demands for them to move.

About 20 Ukrainians and local supporters gathered on Thibault Square in the city centre, waving flags and banners, praying and chanting “Stop Russia! Stop the War!”. They also delivered speeches and sang their national anthem and other patriotic songs.

The protest marked the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022 – a war which was supposed to last just a few days or at most weeks but has instead dragged on for four years because of Ukraine’s fierce resistance.

But sustaining the protest took some negotiations by the organisers, the Ukrainian Association of South Africa (Uaza). A business on the square claimed the Ukrainians were trespassing on its private property, which the company had offered to a film crew to shoot a commercial at the same time.

Uaza officials insisted they were protesting on public City of Cape Town property and had received permission from the city to do so more than two months ago.

SA Police Services Captain Stephanus at first took the side of the company and asked the Ukrainians to leave. But after some discussion he backed down and let them stay.

The focus of the protest was Russia’s abduction of Ukrainian children during the war – at least 19,500 of them, according to Uaza president Kateryna Aloshyna.

Russia had “developed a large state-run network for militarisation and indoctrination of children, aiming to create more soldiers who would be prepared to die for the Russian imperial war”, she said in her speech.

Return of Ukrainian children

“But the majority of South Africans condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine and celebrate that South Africa has voted in support of the UN General Assembly resolution on the return of Ukrainian children.”

After abstaining from all previous resolutions at the UN General Assembly since March 2022 condemning Russia’s invasion, in December last year SA voted in favour of a General Assembly resolution demanding the immediate return of the abducted children.

“We are grateful to South Africa and President Ramaphosa for the support in returning of Ukrainian children,” Aloshyna said.

Apart from the UN resolution, she thanked South Africa for joining a group of countries engaging in negotiations with Russia for the return of Ukrainian children. She said the countries included Qatar, the Vatican, Austria and Lithuania.

Aloshyna also thanked President Ramaphosa for asking Russian President Vladimir Putin to return Ukrainian children when he met Putin during the African Peace Mission to Ukraine and Russia in June 2023.

She also thanked Anglican Archbishop Thabo Makgoba for urging the South African government to support the return of the Ukrainian children. And she thanked the 13 South African child rights and human rights organisations that had signed a petition calling for the return of the children.

Aloshyna said that as of February 20 this year only 2,003 of the Ukrainian children which Russia had deported or forcibly transferred had been returned home.

“More than 380 children have been forcibly adopted into Russian families,” she said. In addition the International Criminal Court had issued arrest warrants for Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s Children’s Rights Commissioner, for the deportation of Ukrainian children.

When Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Pretoria in April last year he gave Ramaphosa a list of names of 400 abducted children and asked for South Africa’s help to bring them home. None have been returned, as far as is known.

Uaza honorary president Dzvinka Kachur told the protest that 2025 had been the deadliest year of the war for Ukrainian civilians, with 2,514 killed and 12,142 injured, according to the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine.

More than 216,000 war crimes committed by Russia against Ukrainians had been documented, she added.

Kachur said Russia’s total losses had exceeded 1.2 million soldiers since 2022, with the highest losses recorded in 2025.

To replenish its troops, Russia was “recruiting vulnerable Africans, luring them with money into a death squads and throwing them onto the frontlines. Abusing the vulnerability of those African citizens who are unable to provide for their families, Russia aims to continue sending people to die, but not Russians – Africans,” she said.

Return of SA men from Russia

On Tuesday, 24 February, Ramaphosa welcomed the return of the South African men whom he said had been “lured into the battle lines between Russia and Ukraine by South African elements that remain under investigation”.

He expressed his “heartfelt gratitude” to Putin, who he said had responded positively to his telephone call on 10 February to help get the 17 men home.

Ramaphosa said four were already back in SA and 11 would be on their way home soon. “Two remain in Russia, with one in a hospital in Moscow, while the other one is being processed before finalising his travel arrangements,” he added.

What he did not say was that the 17 men had been recruited to fight for the Russians against Ukraine. The men were apparently sent with very little or no training to the frontline in Ukraine’s hotly contested Donbas region more than seven months ago.

Kachur said Putin had expected to take over Ukraine in a few weeks. Instead Ukraine had been “resisting Russian imperial ambitions” for more than four years, and Russia still did not fully control any of the four provinces it had declared to be part of Russia. DM