Documents destroyed due to hostilities cannot deprive a person of their right to inheritance

In the spring of 2022, during the intense fighting in Mariupol, an entire apartment building was destroyed. Dozens of residents were killed under the rubble — only two survived.

One of them was Viktoriia*. She spent several days trapped beneath the ruins before being rescued. In that tragedy, Viktoriia lost not only her home but also her mother — and with her, nearly all vital documents: her passport, tax identification number, birth certificate, will, and property papers.

After her mother’s death, Viktoriia had a legal right to inherit the apartment, but without documents it was impossible to formalize the succession. The notary could not issue a certificate of inheritance — Mariupol’s archives had been destroyed, and restoring duplicates proved impossible. Another challenge was the will that her mother had drawn up in the 1990s. Only general registry data confirmed its existence, without the text itself. Both paper copies (at home and in the notarial archive) were lost in the fighting. To make matters worse, some of the other heirs remained in the temporarily occupied territory, further complicating the process.

Viktoriia sought assistance from the NGO STEP. The case was handled by lawyer Danylo Uchkin, who helped collect evidence of ownership rights to the destroyed apartment and restore other essential documents — including her passport, tax ID, birth and marriage certificates, and the property’s technical passport.

Once all the evidence was ready, the lawyer filed a lawsuit to have Viktoriia’s ownership rights officially recognized. The court accepted the arguments and granted the claim in full. As a result, Viktoriia’s ownership rights were registered in the State Register of Property Rights to Real Estate, allowing her to apply for compensation for the destroyed apartment.

This story demonstrates that even when documents are destroyed and family members remain in occupied territories, a person does not lose their right to inheritance. What matters is to seek qualified legal aid and not face the problem alone.

* The name has been changed to protect personal data, the image is an illustration and does not reflect the specific events described in the story.

Assistance was provided by NGO STEP in cooperation with the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) and funded by the European Union’s Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations.