Russian Occupation Update, July 17, 2025

Author: Karolina Hird

Data cut off: 11:45 am ET, July 16

ISW’s Russian Occupation Update tracks the activities that occur in the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine. The Occupation Updates examine Russian efforts to consolidate administrative control of annexed areas and forcibly integrate Ukrainian citizens into Russian sociocultural, economic, military, and governance systems. This product line replaces the section of the daily Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment covering activities in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.

To read ISW’s assessment of how Russian activities in occupied areas of Ukraine are part of a coerced Russification and ethnic cleansing campaign, click here.

Key Takeaways:

• Russia continues its systematic persecution of women from occupied Crimea.
• The Crimean occupation administration has reportedly reaped over $28 million in profit from the seizure and nationalization of Ukrainian property in occupied Crimea in the first half of 2025, compared to the $61 million it made off nationalization profits in the first two years of the full-scale invasion.
• Pro-Russian Cossack formations operating in occupied Ukraine are facilitating the militarization of occupied territories and their integration into the Russian Federation.
• The Donetsk Oblast occupation administration is co-opting youth in order to implement Russia’s occupation policies. Youth-focused organizations in occupied Ukraine set multigenerational conditions for the perpetuation of Russia’s occupation by raising and training the next generations of occupation administrators from within the local Ukrainian population.

Russia continues its systematic persecution of women from occupied Crimea. The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed on July 14 that it opened a criminal case against a 24-year-old woman from occupied Stary Krym for “treason and preparation of a terrorist attack,” and published footage of the woman allegedly confessing that she had prepared an assassination attempt against a Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) officer in May 2025.[1] Ukrainian human rights sources, including the Crimean Tatar Resource Center (CTRC), identified the woman in the video as Crimean Tatar Khatidze Buyukchan, whom the FSB detained without explanation on May 8.[2] ISW reported at the time that the FSB detained Buyukchan without reason, switched off her phone, and denied her family information about her whereabouts and condition for over two months, and CTRC noted that this is the first time the FSB has publicly confirmed her detention since her arrest.[3] CTRC assessed that the FSB coerced Buyukchan to make a fabricated confession on camera for propagandic value.[4] Russian occupation officials are weaponizing spurious or overblown “treason” charges to prosecute residents of occupied Crimea, increasingly including women, for perceived anti-Russian or pro-Ukrainian behavior, as appears to be the case with the charges against Buyukchan.[5] The FSB’s treatment of Buyukchan is also consistent with Russia’s longstanding persecution of the Crimean Tatar community for fabricated “extremist” charges.[6]

The conditions that Ukrainian women face in Russian detention are often harrowing. Crimea-based nurse and human rights activist Iryna Danylovych, whom Russian forces detained in April 2022, issued an appeal to the European Parliament via her relatives on July 15 regarding her treatment while in detention at Women’s Penal Colony No. 7 in Zelenokumsk, Stavropol Krai.[7] Danylovych stated that Russian guards use “traceless torture” methods such as unbearably bright lights, blasting noise at extreme volume, and sleep deprivation to make life unbearable for women at the colony.[8] Ukrainian human rights organizations previously reported that Russian guards had denied Danylovych with needed medical and sanitary care, and that Danylovych risks losing her hearing entirely as a result of her maltreatment.[9] ISW previously assessed, citing an investigation by the Viktoriia Project journalism collective, that Russia is pursuing a deeply systematic and institutionalized policy of torture against Ukrainians, including Ukrainian women, in Russian detention centers.[10] Danylovych’s case is exemplary of the lengths that Russia is willing to go to suppress pro-Ukrainian activism in occupied territories.

The Crimean occupation administration has reportedly reaped over $28 million in profit from the seizure and nationalization of Ukrainian property in occupied Crimea in the first half of 2025. Chairman of the Crimean state occupation council Vladimir Konstantinov claimed on July 15 that the occupation administration has sold 25 property objects nationalized from “the enemies of Crimea and Russia,” earning 2.2 billion rubles (about $28 million) for the Crimean budget in the first six months of 2025.[11] Konstantinov claimed that the occupation administration would use the funds to develop Crimea and pay benefits to Russian soldiers fighting against Ukraine. Russia uses the seizure and nationalization of property objects as a punitive measure in occupied Ukraine by robbing Ukrainians of their real estate assets.[12] ISW has reported at length on how Russia also uses property seizures and nationalizations to generate a profit off of its occupation of Ukraine by effectively using the sales of these properties as an income source for the Russian budget.[13] The Crimea occupation administration notably appears to be escalating efforts to sell off nationalized property. Nationalization profits amounted to 4.8 billion rubles ($61 million) between 2022 and 2024, whereas the value for the first six months of 2025 alone (2.2 billion rubles/$28 million) is almost half of what was generated in the first two years of the full-scale invasion.[14]

Pro-Russian Cossack formations operating in occupied Ukraine are facilitating the militarization of occupied territories and their integration into the Russian Federation. Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) Head Leonid Pasechnik announced in June 2025 the creation of the Luhansk Cossack District and that Cossack veteran and Hero of the LNR Vladimir Polupoltinnykh was elected as the ataman (Cossack leader) of the new district.[15] Polupoltinnykh served with LNR militias in 2014 and participated in the Russian seizure of Lysychansk, Luhansk Oblast, in 2022.[16] In an interview with the occupied Luhansk Oblast branch of Russian outlet Komsomolskaya Pravda, Polupoltinnykh claimed that he hopes to revive Cossack traditions in occupied Luhansk and to unite all Luhansk Cossack organizations “under one banner.”[17] Polupoltinnykh claimed that there are Cossack organizations in “50 percent” of occupied Luhansk Oblast, and that there are dedicated Cossack cadet corps and classes in schools throughout the oblast. Russia uses Cossack communities to indoctrinate and militarize residents of occupied Ukraine and to exercise control over civil society functions, which Cossack formations frequently fill in Russia.[18] Polupoltinnykh appears to be focusing as ataman on consolidating control over sometimes disparate Cossack organizations operating in occupied Luhansk Oblast, as well as strengthening youth outreach via cadet programs and schools.

The Donetsk Oblast occupation administration is co-opting youth in order to implement Russia’s occupation policies. Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) Head Denis Pushilin announced on July 16 that a convocation of 40 young people (aged 18 to 30) from occupied Donetsk Oblast became deputies of the DNR’s Youth Parliament.[19] The convocation reportedly includes both younger veterans of the war in Ukraine and residents of unspecified areas of Donetsk Oblast, which Russia has occupied since 2022. Pushilin noted that the Youth Parliament will focus on public control (monitoring activities of state and local government bodies) and youth engagement as part of its mandate. The DNR Youth Parliament is chiefly an advisory and consultative body to the DNR occupation government, and as such, seeks to embed young Ukrainians into the occupation administration and teach them how to implement Russia’s occupation policy. Youth-focused organizations like the DNR Youth Parliament intend to set multigenerational conditions for the perpetuation of Russia’s occupation of Ukraine by raising and training the next generations of occupation administrators from within the local Ukrainian population.

[1] http://www.fsb dot ru/fsb/press/message/single.htm%21id%3D10440337%40fsbMessage.html; https://zona.media/news/2025/07/14/stary-krym; https://t.me/astrapress/86458 ; https://t.me/rian_ru/304819

[2] https://krymsos dot com/krymsos-shhoroku-peresliduvannya-zhinok-v-krymu-stayut-dedali-serjoznishymy/; https://ctrcenter dot org/ru/bolee-dvuh-mesyaczev-neizvestnosti-v-okkupirovannom-krymu-fsb-oficzialno-priznala-zaderzhanie-24-letnej-hatidzhe-buyukchan

[3] https://isw.pub/OccupationUpdate051225; https://ctrcenter dot org/ru/bolee-dvuh-mesyaczev-neizvestnosti-v-okkupirovannom-krymu-fsb-oficzialno-priznala-zaderzhanie-24-letnej-hatidzhe-buyukchan

[4] https://ctrcenter dot org/ru/bolee-dvuh-mesyaczev-neizvestnosti-v-okkupirovannom-krymu-fsb-oficzialno-priznala-zaderzhanie-24-letnej-hatidzhe-buyukchan

[5] https://isw.pub/OccupationUpdate060925

[6] https://isw.pub/OccupationUpdate052225; https://isw.pub/OccupationUpdate042125; https://isw.pub/RussianOccupationUpdate041025

[7] https://t.me/tribunal_crimean/286; https://khpg.org/1608814810; https://zmina.info/news/metody-gestapo-polituvyaznena-iryna-danylovych-prosyt-yevroparlament-zasudyty-tortury-v-rosiyskiy-koloniyi/; https://ru.krymr.com/a/news-danilovich-soobshchila-o-besslednykh-pytkakh/33474775.html

[8] https://t.me/tribunal_crimean/286

[9] https://zmina dot info/news/branka-kremlya-iryna-danylovych-ne-mozhe-otrymaty-neobhidni-liky-v-rosijskij-koloniyi/; https://zmina dot info/news/medyk-u-rosijskij-koloniyi-lidiya-morozova-pozbavyla-dostupu-krymskoyi-zhurnalistky-danylovych-do-neobhidnyh-likiv/; https://ombudsman.gov dot ua/news_details/ombudsman-nezakonno-zasudzhena-gromadyanska-zhurnalistka-irina-danilovich-zaznaye-tortur-i-rizikuye-povnistyu-vtratiti-sluh

[10] https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-occupation-update-may-5-2025

[11] https://t.me/va_konstantinov/6757

[12] https://krymsos dot com/krymsos-naczionalizacziya-obyektiv-prava-vlasnosti-instrument-tysku-na-neloyalnyh-meshkancziv-krymu/

[13] https://isw.pub/RussianOccupationUpdate041025; https://isw.pub/OccupationUpdate050825

[14] https://krymsos dot com/krymsos-naczionalizacziya-obyektiv-prava-vlasnosti-instrument-tysku-na-neloyalnyh-meshkancziv-krymu/

[15] https://tass dot ru/obschestvo/24204795

[16] https://www.lugansk dot kp.ru/daily/27726/5114951/

[17] https://www.lugansk dot kp.ru/daily/27726/5114951/

[18] https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-occupation-update-may-19-2025

[19] https://t.me/PushilinDenis/6984