The European Commission is launching a joint initiative with Poland to find Ukrainian children that were forcefully transported into Russia and subjected to forced adoptions, Polskieradio reports. Commission spokeswoman Dana Spinant said details of the joint initiative would be unveiled in the coming days, and Poland’s European affairs minister, Szymon Szynkowski vel Sęk, informed about it on Saturday.
Commission spokeswoman Dana Spinant said details of the joint initiative would be unveiled in the coming days. “It’s about joining forces, collecting evidence so that kidnapped children are found, and those responsible are brought to justice.” This is a huge social problem, a tragedy, and a crime, added the spokeswoman. The joint initiative will be led by Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Commission President Ursula von der Leyen with the support of UN agencies.
Warsaw has been paying attention to this issue for a long time in the European Union. Addressing this issue by the Commission was one of the conditions on which Poland agreed to the tenth package of sanctions against Russia.
The Polish Ambassador to the Union, Andrzej Sadoś, informed that this action will consist of various initiatives.
Some initiatives will be of a small international nature, including on the UN forum, also in terms of sanctions, the Polish ambassador said. He added that several people responsible for the deportation of Ukrainian children have already been subject to EU restrictions. Still, Poland wants to automatically sanction institutions and people involved in systemic, illegal deportations of children.
Russia has deported between 260,000 and nearly 700,000 minors from Ukraine. The majority of them were relocated with their legal guardians, a report by Ukrainian human rights defenders estimates.
Recently, Ukraine imposed sanctions on Russian entities involved in the abduction of Ukrainian children.
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