‘Basically impossible to get them back’: Russia’s mass abduction of Ukrainian children is a war crime, say experts

Ukrainian children from a Donetsk orphanage at a camp in Zolotaya Kosa, Russia. Up to 35,000 Ukrainian children may be held in Russia, with many feared to have been adopted. Photograph: AP

As many as 35,000 Ukrainian children are still missing and thought to be held in Russia or Russian-occupied territories, according to an American team of experts, with families saying they are being forced to take desperate and risky measures to try to rescue them.

As Russian forces began their invasion in February 2022, children were abducted from care homes, from the battlefield after the death of their parents, or under coercion directly from their families.