Qatar mediates between Russia and Ukraine on abducted children

Qatar has begun acting as a mediator for negotiations between Russia and Ukraine to secure the release of Ukrainian children who have been forcibly kidnapped and taken to Russian territory over the course of the war.

Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets met with Qatari Minister of State for International Cooperation Lolwah al Khater this week. He passed along a list of 561 Ukrainian children believed to be illegally held in Russia and has since said they have been informed that the Russian side has begun processing it.

While this list Lubinets provided to Qatari officials had 561 names on it, he indicated there could be more than 3,600 kidnapped children who have become orphans during the war.

“Qatar has also agreed to accept the first list of orphans and children deprived of parental care and to work on the issue of their return to Ukraine. According to our data, there may be more than 3,600 such children,” he said on Facebook, while leaders have also said there could be as many as 20,000 children who have been taken from Ukraine to Russia against their will.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Wednesday that 16 children who had been deported to Russia were in Qatar for medical and mental recovery and would be reunited with their loved ones.

“A group of 16 Ukrainian children and their relatives are currently in Qatar for medical, mental, and social recovery. All of them had previously been forcibly deported to Russia, but thanks to our friendly Qatar’s mediation efforts, they have been released and reunited with their families,” he said. “Thousands of other forcibly deported Ukrainian children remain in Russia. It is heartbreaking to realize that, as time passes, they are growing up apart from their families and homeland.”

The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, a body of 18 independent experts that monitors the implementation of the convention, said in February that the deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia was “in violation of rights under the convention.”

“It is our conclusion that there is evidence of forceful transfer of children from Ukraine to Russia,” Bragi Gudbrandsson, vice chairman of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, said at the time. “We cannot identify the number of these children, but we know there are many and we can support this with the actual measures Russia has taken to simplify procedures to acquire Russian citizenship and to place Ukrainian children with Russian families.”

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The International Criminal Court announced an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin in March 2023, accusing him of being responsible for these child deportations, in which they’ve undergone political reeducation training.

They also issued an arrest warrant for Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, the commissioner for children’s rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation, whom they said also shared responsibility for them.