Five Ukrainian and Russian children separated from their families during the four-year-old European war are back with their relatives, first lady Melania Trump announced Thursday morning.
“While diplomacy and peacebuilding are important to this effort, they are surpassed by our collective ability to place children above international disputes,” the Slovenia-born Melania said in a statement released by the White House. “Every reunion is a reminder that compassion, dignity, and family can transcend even the darkest of times: war. My representative and I continue working with the governments of Russia and Ukraine to safely return children to their families and communities.”
Thursday marked the fifth time kids affected by Europe’s biggest conflict since World War II have been reunited with their families since the first lady announced this past October that she established an “open channel” with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss the topic.
As in other cases, the statement did not say how many children of each nationality were brought home.
Thousands of Ukrainian children have been taken from homes, orphanages, and boarding schools to Russia since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
The United Nations said in March of this year that it had verified the abduction of more than 1,200 kids from five separate regions of Ukraine. However, the Kyiv government has claimed the true number is as high as 20,000.
The global body’s Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine said that while Russian authorities claimed the removals were for safety reasons, the fact that 80% of the children had not been returned after four years of war indicated otherwise.
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