Several Russia-installed proxy officials in occupied Donetsk Oblast have been declared suspected of forcibly deporting a group of 31 Ukrainian children to Russia, Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office announced on Oct. 1.
The Prosecutor General's Office named Denys Pushylin, the Russia-installed proxy head of Donetsk Oblast, and two of his officials, Eleanora Fedorenko and Svitlana Maiboroda, as suspects in the case.
Maiboroda was identified by the Kyiv Independent's War Crimes Investigations Unit in their documentary "Uprooted." The team passed on the evidence collected during the making of the film to the prosecutors.
The Prosecutor General's Office expressed gratitude to Ukrainian investigative journalists, including the Kyiv Independent, who conducted investigations into the deportations and passed on their materials.
Russian authorities and their collaborators have illegally deported thousands of Ukrainian children from occupied territories to Russia and placed them in foster families, where they are raised as Russians.
This particular case concerns the deportation of 19 orphans from Mariupol and nine children from the cities of Shakhtarsk and Khartsyzk in Donetsk Oblast. Another three children from Mariupol were taken away from their father at a filtration camp.
The suspects facilitated the deportation of the group of children, the youngest of whom was six years old at the time, from Ukrainian territory.
The transfer of the children "did not meet the requirements of international humanitarian law, as it was not justified by security or health reasons," the Prosecutor General's Office noted.
Martin Fornusek
According to the Prosecutor General's Office, the children were first taken by bus to the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and later taken by plane to Moscow.
Ukrainian investigators found that the plane used to organize the flight belongs to a particular unit that is subordinate to Russian President Vladimir Putin's administration.
Despite being Ukrainian, the children were issued Russian passports and given to Russian adoptive families.
Among the group was a 17-year-old from Mariupol who was effectively adopted by Maria Lvova-Belova, Putin's Commissioner for Children's Rights and the Kremlin official who allegedly oversees the forced deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia.
In March 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova for their roles in the illegal deportation of Ukrainian children.
The three children from Mariupol managed to reunite with their father on their own, while three teenagers were returned to Ukraine by the Ukrainian authorities. The other 25 children remain in Russia.
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