CNN
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Reading Maria Lvova-Belova’s social media, one might think that Russia selflessly rescues Ukrainian children from evil and cares for Russian families desperate to share their love. I can’t.
But a new report by Yale University investigators backed by U.S. and European governments and the U.S. State Department says she was at the center of a Russian government plan to send thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia. At the center of a plan to deport them. Camps where minors undergo political re-education.
“Maria Libova Belova is the person most involved in the deportation and adoption of Ukrainian children by Russia and the use of camps to “integrate” Ukrainian children into Russian society and culture. ,” said the Yale Institute for Humanities Conflict Observatory. I have written.
Appointed to President Vladimir Putin’s Children’s Rights Commissioner in 2021, Lvova-Belova created her Telegram channel days after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Between photos alongside Russian powers-tables, from Putin to Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, she glosses over the wonderful life supposedly being offered to Ukrainian children. I post photos and videos.
“By the end of the week, 108 orphans from Donbass who have acquired Russian citizenship will have parents,” said a typical post on the Telegram channel last July from the Ukrainian Donbass (Donetsk and Donetsk khansk). ) region. “Shurochka was first handed over to her mother. When I heard the laughter of this happy child, I could not stand [tears]”
Lvova-Belova is a regular visitor to Russian-occupied Ukraine, and the Russian government boasts that she personally escorts children on flights home from Ukraine. Putin has authorized Lvova-Belova to use unspecified “additional measures” to identify children without parental care in four regions of Ukraine it claims to have annexed.
UNICEF, the United Nations children’s organization, has stated that “adoption should not take place during or immediately after an emergency” and that children separated from their parents during upheaval cannot be considered orphans. The United Nations also considers the forcible transfer of the population of another country within or outside its borders a war crime.
Russia called reports of forced migration “ridiculous” and said it would “do its best” to keep minors with their families.
In another typical post, from December, Lvova-Belova circulated a photo of herself at the dinner table with a Russian family in the Kaluga region.
“Frankly, I crossed the threshold in horror. “But all doubts were swept away in the first few minutes. The family is wonderful!”
“For me, this is another confirmation that the work we have been doing to place the Donbass orphans has not been in vain. Everything has been done right.”
The United States, the European Union, and the United Kingdom have all sanctioned her for her alleged role in the scheme. Forced adoption, the so-called “patriotic education” of Ukrainian children, legislative changes to facilitate the provision of Ukrainian children citizenship of the Russian Federation and the deliberate exclusion of Ukrainian children included. by the Russian military,” the U.S. Treasury Department said in September.
She enjoyed the nomination.
“We thank the UK for drawing attention to our mission to help the children of Donbass,” she wrote in June. I enjoy friendship as people affected by
Lvova-Belova is the mother of at least ten children (biological and adopted) with her husband, an Orthodox priest.
Lvova-Belova was born in the western city of Penza and started her career as a children’s guitar teacher. She eventually became involved in local politics and climbed the Russian power structure.
In a tearful TV news report posted on her Telegram channel in November, Lvova-Belova recalled adopting a teenage boy from Mariupol. The boy said he was taken in by her guardian after her mother died of cancer.
“She is the most beautiful person I have ever met in my life,” Philip says of his adoptive mother. “She never loved me like she did.”
It is unclear under what circumstances the young man was interviewed, including whether he was coerced into speaking.
For Ukrainian children, she launched a program called “The Day After Tomorrow” to help them adjust to life in Russia.
Alongside idyllic photos of campfires by the Black Sea, she said last August that Ukrainian children in the Donetsk region were having a “special camping season.”
“The camp has nine themed workshops to help teenagers formulate their own life plans and professional guidelines. We are looking forward to the opening of the camp!”
On Wednesday, the Russian embassy in Washington dismissed US accusations that Ukrainian children were forcibly moved as “ridiculous.”
In a Telegram statement, the embassy said, “We took note of the ridiculous statement by State Department spokesperson Ned Price that he accused our country of the ‘forcible deportation and deportation of Ukrainian children’ to the territory of the Russian Federation.” Stated.
“Russia accepted children who were forced to flee with their families from the shelling and atrocities of the Ukrainian army. In addition, we will do our best to place orphans in custody, and we will ensure their lives and well-being.”
The embassy went on to accuse Washington, which provides military aid to the Ukrainian army, of being complicit in the alleged death of a child in Russia-occupied eastern Ukraine.
