Ukrainian child found safe with close associate of Putin

Though they are now “available to turn this trust [of voters] into action,” Mr. Omtzigt’s New Social Contract party first stated they would not collaborate with Mr. Wilders.

According to records found by BBC’s Panorama, one of Vladimir Putin’s most important political allies adopted a child taken from a children’s home in Ukraine.

A 70-year-old Russian political party leader named Sergey Mironov appears on the adoption record of a two-year-old child adopted in 2022 by the lady he is currently married to.

Records indicate that in Russia, the girl’s identification was altered.

Requests for comment from Mr. Mironov have not been answered.

On his Telegram account, he did, however, publish a general critique this morning on misinformation campaigns against him and his family.

When Russian forces took over the city, the youngster—originally named Margarita—was one of 48 children who vanished from Kherson Regional Children’s Home.

They are among the roughly 20,000 kids that Russian forces are said to have abducted by the Ukrainian government since the full-scale invasion began in 2022.

For the alleged illegal deportation of Ukrainian children to territory under Russian control with the goal of their permanent removal from their own country, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants earlier this year for President Vladimir Putin and his Commissioner for Children’s Rights, Maria Lvova-Belova.

According to the Russian government, it evacuates Ukrainian children to protect them from the fighting rather than deporting them.

To learn more about Margarita’s and the other children’s fate, the BBC collaborated with Victoria Novikova, a Ukrainian human rights investigator. For Ukraine’s prosecutor-general’s office, which will give it to the ICC, Ms. Novikova has put together a dossier containing fresh material.

When a woman wearing a lilac dress showed up at Kherson’s children’s hospital in August 2022, while the 10-month-old was receiving treatment for bronchitis, that’s when the mystery surrounding Margarita started.

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At the children’s home in the area, which cared for kids with medical issues or whose parents had passed away or lost custody, Margarita was the youngest inhabitant.

Shortly after her birth, Margarita’s mother had given up custody, and her father’s whereabouts were a mystery.

She was a happy baby who enjoyed cuddling with others, according to Dr. Nataliya Lyutikova, who oversaw the hospital’s infant care department.

According to Dr. Lyutikova, the woman in lilac identified herself as “the head of children’s affairs from Moscow”.

At the time, Kherson was in its sixth month of Russian occupation. It is currently back under Ukrainian sovereignty.

Following the woman’s departure, Dr. Lyutikova claims she was contacted repeatedly by a Russian-appointed official who had just taken over the children’s home. The authority insisted that Margarita be sent straight back to the house.

Margarita was allowed to leave the hospital after only one week. Workers at the children’s home were urged to get her ready for a ride the next morning.

The home’s nurse, Lyubov Sayko, stated, “We were afraid, everyone was afraid.”

She explained that a group of Russian males, some dressed in military-style camouflage pants and one carrying a briefcase and wearing dark glasses, had come to pick up the girl.

“It was like something out of a film,” she explained.

It was only the beginning, though.

BBC