The administration of the US President Donald Trump has terminated an initiative that documented cases of mass deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia.
This is reported by The Washington Post (WP), citing its own sources.
Anonymous American officials say the move has prohibited the transfer of evidence to prosecutors in criminal cases, including the illegal transfer of children from occupied territories of Ukraine.
Last month, researchers involved in a related initiative at Yale Universityʼs Humanities Research Laboratory were informed that the US State Department was terminating their contract, citing a desire to cut budget spending.
Then, experts lost access to a huge amount of information, including satellite imagery and biometric data that tracked the whereabouts of about 35 000 Ukrainian children.
Officials are most concerned that the research labʼs databases could have been deleted in a rush to comply with the administrationʼs orders. If the information was not deleted but moved somewhere, it could be compromised and the digital evidence would be inadmissible in court.
The State Department confirmed to WP that funding for the initiative had been stopped, but did not say what happened to the data. MITRE, the non-governmental organization that manages the database, declined to comment.
“The Trump administration, whether through incompetence or intent, has questioned the veracity of the war crimes evidence collected over three years and funded by taxpayers to the tune of $26 million,” the source says.
The fallout has also affected Trumpʼs efforts to end the war in Ukraine, the publication writes. Volodymyr Zelensky has said that any peace deal must include Russiaʼs return of missing Ukrainian children and holding those responsible for these crimes accountable. Marco Rubio recently called the return of the children an important issue that needs to be resolved.
The database was supposed to be transferred to Europol
- The US began investigating Russian war crimes in May 2022. Experts have prepared 13 public reports on Russiaʼs aggression in Ukraine, as well as six International Criminal Court indictments against Russian officials, including Putin.
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