Five more children — two girls and three boys — were returned from the temporarily occupied territories of the Kherson region.
The head of the Kherson Regional Military Administration Oleksandr Prokudin informed about this.
The youngest child is 4 years old, and the oldest is 16, among the rescued children there is one orphan. They are now in a safe place and receiving the necessary treatment.
In total, since the beginning of the year, it has been possible to return 25 children from the Kherson region.
- The deportation of Ukrainian children is one of Russiaʼs war crimes, for which the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin and the Childrenʼs Ombudsman of the Russian Federation Maria Lvova-Belova. Currently, at least 19 546 Ukrainian children are known to have been forcibly deported to Russia. Ukraine also has evidence that Belarus participates in the deportation of Ukrainian children.
- In January 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued an order granting Ukrainian children Russian citizenship. The order states that orphans and children with Ukrainian citizenship, who were left without parental care, can receive Russian by Putinʼs personal decision, regardless of all or individual requirements of federal legislation. This can be used so that the deported Ukrainian children do not "legally" remain on the territory of Russia. Accordingly, it will be more difficult to prove this war crime.