The move follows Ukraine's ratification of the minerals agreement, deepening U.S.-Ukraine economic ties and signaling expanded U.S. involvement in Ukraine's long-term recovery.
"Ukraine has initiated a coordinated campaign to vilify Hungary in order to undermine our initiative to hold a poll on (Kyiv's) EU membership," Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz warned that further concessions from Ukraine during negotiations would be unreasonable if Russia continues to attack civilian targets.
U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg, will travel to Istanbul for possible peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, Reuters reported on May 13, citing three undisclosed sources.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said he will meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara, but said both leaders are ready to fly to Istanbul if Russian President Vladimir Putin chooses to attend the talks there.
A captive named Umit allegedly agreed to serve in the Russian army in exchange for Russian citizenship and a monetary reward of 2 million rubles ($25,000).
Russia's Buryatia Republic declared a state of emergency on May 13 over massive forest fires that have engulfed multiple regions in the Russian Far East.
Maria Lvova-Belova holds a press conference at the Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow on April 4, 2023. (Photo by ALEXANDER NEMENOV/AFP via Getty Images)
Russian Presidential Commissioner for Children's Rights Maria Lvova-Belova claimed that 700,000 Ukrainian children have been brought to Russia since the start of the full-scale invasion.
In total, she said about 4.8 million Ukrainians have been "accepted" into Russia and claimed most children arrived with relatives. The numbers include 1,500 children who lived in orphanages or state institutions.
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Lvova-Belova and Russian President Vladimir Putin for their involvement in the forced deportation of Ukrainian children during Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine.
In February, Putin praised Lvova-Belova for her work overseeing the deportation of Ukrainian children, portraying it as a so-called “humanitarian effort” to “protect Russian citizens.”
In Russia, deported Ukrainian children are placed in hotels, summer camps, recreation centers, and shelters, where the conditions are often poor, according to the report by a coalition of Ukrainian NGOs that documents Russia's war crimes.
A study by the Yale School of Public Health shows that Moscow has established a whole "network of re-education and adoption facilities" in Russia and occupied Crimea, with 43 camps where Ukrainian children have been held since Feb. 24, 2022, already identified.
International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan said he believes Russia is treating children like “spoils of war," and that the Kremlin does not seem to be denying the allegations against it but rather wearing it “like a badge of honor."
Russia withdrew from the ICC in 2016 following its criticism of Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea.
More than 19,500 children have been identified by the Ukrainian government as having been deported. 385 of them have been returned to Ukraine.
Daria Shulzhenko
