Ukraine returns three more children from occupation: mother was forced to send them to Russian school

The head of the Kherson Regional Military Administration, Oleksandr Prokudin, reported. 

"A foster family with 3 orphans and children deprived of parental care was returned to the territory controlled by Ukraine. Two boys and a girl, aged 11 to 17," the statement reads. 

Prokudin said that the Russians forced the boys and the girl to attend Russian schools: their mother was threatened that if they refused, they would take the children away. Due to the pressure and persecution, the family lived in constant stress, and they hardly ever went outside. 

"Now the mother and children are undergoing rehabilitation. They are in a safe place where they are receiving the necessary medical and psychological assistance," said Prokudin. 

He thanked the Save Ukraine charity organization, guardianship and trusteeship agencies, and the Children's Service for their help in returning the children. 

What is known about the return of children from TOT

On September 14, 2023, Human Rights Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said that 386 young Ukrainians had been returned home since the creation of a separate coordination headquarters for children. These are only those children who were deported to the territory of the Russian Federation. At the same time, the number of children returned from the occupation will be counted separately.

"We decided to divide these figures because it is one thing to return a child from the territory of the Russian Federation after deportation, and another thing is when we return children who were forcibly displaced within the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine," Lubinets said.

In November, Save Ukraine brought four children with their families from the occupied territories. On December 14, four more children were returned from the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. The parents of one of the children serve in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

On December 16, Ukraine, with the assistance of Qatar, returned three more children abducted by Russia. On February 20, it became known that 11 Ukrainian children had been returned from Russian occupation.

On February 24, 2024, Ukraine managed to return two teenage sisters who had been living under Russian occupation in a village in the Luhansk region for almost two years, and later a mother with four children and a 17-year-old boy from the occupied left bank of the Kherson region.