Eight Ukrainian children returned home from Russian-occupied parts of Kherson Oblast, regional governor Oleksandr Prokrudin said on Aug. 3.
“The children were met in their native land and all the horrors for them are behind them,” Prokrudin said in a Telegram post.
Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, Moscow has abducted Ukrainian children from occupied territories and forcibly transfer them within the occupied territories or to Russia itself. According to the Ukrainian government’s database, Russia has illegally abducted at least 19,500 children since February 2022, and less than 400 have returned home thus far.
Taking hostage people who take no active part in hostilities breaches the Geneva Conventions and constitutes a war crime.
In a statement released on Aug. 3, Prokrudin said the eight children who returned home include five girls and three boys, aged between six and 17. The governor thanked the Ukrainian humanitarian NGO Save Ukraine for making the return of the children possible.
So far in 2024, 162 children from occupied parts of Kherson Oblast have returned to their homes in Ukrainian-controlled territories in 2024 alone, according to Prokrudin.
Kyiv and Western allies have condemned Russia’s systematic abduction of Ukrainian children, with the International Criminal Court (ICC) issuing arrest warrants in March 2023 for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russian Children's Rights Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova for allegedly overseeing the forced deportations of Ukrainian children to Russia.
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