UNITED NATIONS (AP) – Russia’s child rights envoy, wanted on war crimes charges for deporting children from Ukraine, said at a UN meeting on Wednesday that the children were being taken for their safety and Moscow is coordinating with international organizations to bring them back to their home families.
Ambassadors from Western countries boycotted the informal meeting of the UN Security Council, sending low-level diplomats instead. Diplomats from the United States, Britain, Albania and Malta exited as Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova began addressing the meeting via video link.
The International Criminal Court last month issued an arrest warrant for her and Russian President Vladimir Putin, accusing them of kidnapping children from Ukraine.
Russia, which holds the rotating presidency of the Security Council this month, convened the meeting to counter alleged disinformation about Ukraine’s children.
US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told reporters before the meeting that the United States strongly opposed the briefing and joined the United Kingdom in preventing the United Nations from outside broadcasting the meeting.
Lvova-Belova should not be allowed “to have an international podium to spread disinformation and try to defend their horrific actions that are taking place in Ukraine,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
An Associated Press investigation into Lvova-Belova’s involvement in the kidnapping of Ukrainians, published in October, found that open efforts to put Ukrainian children up for adoption in Russia were well under way.
The exact number of Ukrainian children brought to Russia was difficult to determine. A statement by Ukraine’s Ambassador to the UN, Sergiy Kyslytsya, published on Twitter on Wednesday said more than 19,500 children had been confiscated from their families or orphanages and forcibly deported.
Russia’s Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said the goal of Wednesday’s meeting was to “debunk the West’s apparent double standards.”
“Part of this propaganda campaign is the West’s cover-up about the fact that in European countries Ukrainian refugees are having their children taken away,” he said. Videos were then shown of some women claiming their children had been abducted in Europe.
Nebenzia also insisted that, contrary to Western claims, there had been “no forced adoptions.” He said some Ukrainian children are in foster care and claimed there are “no barriers” for them to keep in touch with their families in Ukraine.
The AP investigation found that Russian officials deported Ukrainian children to Russia without their parents’ consent, lied to them that their parents didn’t want them, used them for propaganda, and gave them Russian families and citizenships.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russia has taken in more than 5 million Ukrainians, including 700,000 children – all with parents, relatives or legal guardians, excluding 2,000 from orphanages in eastern Donbass, according to Lvova-Belova.
To date, she said, about 1,300 children have been returned to their orphanages, 400 have been sent to Russian orphanages and 358 have been placed in foster care.
Lvova-Belova said there had been no official communication with Ukrainian authorities about the children, but she said her office had met with representatives from UNICEF, Refugees International and the Red Cross and provided all available information about the children. She said Russia is coordinating reunification with the Red Cross.
Sarah Sheffer, vice president of strategic public relations at Refugees International, denied it. She said Russia did not consult with her organization about the Ukrainian children.
UNICEF and the International Committee of the Red Cross, which is responsible for reuniting families, did not immediately respond to requests for confirmation of Lvova-Belova’s statements.
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