Russian children's commissioner rejects ICC war crime allegations as false (updated)

ICC Holdings

04/04/2023 09:24

(Recasts, adds details on Lvova-Belova's comments)
    By Guy Faulconbridge
       MOSCOW, April 4 (Reuters) - Russia's commissioner for
children's rights on Tuesday dismissed International Criminal
Court (ICC) allegations that she was responsible for unlawfully
deporting children from Ukraine as false.   
    The Hague-based ICC on March 17 issued arrest warrants for
President Vladimir Putin and Children's Commissioner Maria
Lvova-Belova for the war crime of unlawfully deporting children
from areas of Ukraine occupied by Russian forces. 
    The ICC said it had information that hundreds of children
had been taken from orphanages and children's care homes in
areas of Ukraine claimed by Russia. Some of those children, the
ICC said, had been given up for adoption in Russia. 
    Lvova-Belova told a news conference in Moscow that the
consent of children's parents had always been sought, that the
commission acted in the best interests of any child, and that it
was more accurate to talk of guardianship rather than adoption. 
 
        If there were specific problems with specific families,
she said she was ready to help solve them.    
  
    "It is unclear to the presidential commissioner for
children's rights what the International Criminal Court's
allegations specifically consist of and what they are based on,"
her commission said in a statement about its work released
before her news conference.
    "The use of the formulation 'unlawful deportation of
population (children)' in the ICC's official statement causes
bewilderment," it said, adding it had not received any documents
from the ICC, whose jurisdiction Russia does not recognise. 
        Donetsk and Luhansk, two Ukrainian regions claimed and
partially controlled by Russia, had asked Russia to accept
civilians, including orphans and children whose parents were
missing, the commission said.      
  
        Lvova-Belova said Russia had accepted more than 5
million refugees from Ukraine's Donbas region, including 730,000
children, since February 2022, when Putin ordered troops into
Ukraine.
  
        The most deadly war in Europe since World War Two has
killed or maimed hundreds of thousands of men on both sides
while millions of adults and children have been displaced by
what has turned into a grinding artillery war.
  
          
  
        CHILDREN
  
        Since the invasion, Ukraine has cast Russia as a brutal
imperial aggressor that has committed war crimes, including the
theft of children. Russia, which says it is carrying out "a
special military operation," says the West has ignored Ukraine's
own crimes.
  
        Lvova-Belova said she rejected the ICC's allegations,
accusations from Ukraine, and what her commission called
disinformation from foreign journalists about alleged
"deportations of children" which she said was false. 
  
        She dismissed claims that children had been taken to
camps for alleged re-education and her commission, she said, did
not know of a single case of a child from eastern Ukraine being
separated from his or her blood relatives to be given up to a
foster home. 
  
    The Kremlin has said the ICC arrest warrant is an
outrageously partisan decision. Russian officials deny war
crimes in Ukraine.  
    Putin allies have cast the ICC, which countries including
China and the United States do not recognise, as a "legal
nonentity." 

 (Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge
Editing by Andrew Osborn)
 ((guy.faulconbridge@thomsonreuters.com; 07825218698;))