The Current - Fight to return Ukrainian children abducted by Russia

Episode Date: October 29, 2024

Ukraine says more than 19,000 children have been taken into Russia since the war began — and most have not returned. Guest host Susan Ormiston talks to Mykola Kuleba, Ukraine’s former children’s ombudsman, who is urging the international community to help bring those children home.

In 2017, it felt like drugs were everywhere in the news, so I started a podcast called On Drugs. We covered a lot of ground over two seasons, but there are still so many more stories to tell. I'm Jeff Turner, and I'm back with Season 3 of On Drugs. And this time, it's going to get personal. I don't know who Sober Jeff is. I don't even know if I like that guy.

On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts. This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current Podcast. After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Russian officials appeared on television to showcase how the state was rescuing Ukrainian children. They said the children had been abandoned in occupied territory and would be given Russian citizenship and adopted by Russian families. Ukrainian officials tell a very different story. They say thousands of children have been taken from orphanages, group homes, even Ukrainian families.

U.S.'s public radio N NPR, spoke to several of the children. We were brainwashed into saying that if Russia wouldn't have invaded, then Ukraine would have invaded first. So I would just not say anything. I would just sit there thinking to myself, glory to Ukraine, my country is going to prevail and win. Yeah, you can say whatever. Mykola Kuleba is the former Children's Ombudsman of Ukraine and founder of Save Ukraine. He's in Ottawa to attend the Canada-led summit on the release of prisoners and deported persons of Ukraine.

Good morning. Good morning. How many children does Ukraine think Russia has taken? We officially identified only 19,500, but it's only that who've been identified. 1.5 million children disappeared during the last 10 years after the invasion started in Crimea and Donbass first and then new occupied territories. And we don't understand how many of them unaccompanied, how many of them orphans. And it could be dozens of thousand children who are just disappear, have been kidnapped.

And we have, we as organization identify these children and returning them. But really, organization identify these children and returning them. But really, it's a bigger problem that just 20,000 for 10 years, it's more. Even 20,000 is a huge number of people, young people. Where are these children being taken from? That's the big controversy. That's the big difference in the stories between Ukraine and Russia. Yeah, you know, it's very complicated. That's why not many people understand what happened there. But it's very clear for Russia because their intention is to totally destroy Ukrainian identity and instill hatred towards Ukraine and militarize these children to make them Russian soldiers.

And we have different stories because, say, Ukraine returned more than 500 children from Russia in occupied territories, even from orphanages and Russian foster families. That's why it's different stories when children have been just brutally kidnapped from their homes or sent to summer camps, so-called summer camps, but it was indoctrination camps, and never returned back. And that's why we found their relatives or parents, and they helped them to return their children back to Ukraine. And it is orphans who've been stolen from orphanages or from foster families and sent to military academies. And we helped them to escape, and we extracted them from Russia and occupied territories. To all of these cases, it's a war crime.

And we document carefully these stories and send to international criminal court. How old are these children that are being taken? All age until 18 years old. But we are saving only that children who could communicate. It's teenagers because these kids can call to our hotline and call to their relatives and we can build this communication because through our strategy, we identify these children and our investigators communicate with these children. And when we're sure that we can safely return child, We are returning child back. Now, you talked about orphanages and places like that where these children have been taken from. But in other cases, where are their parents? What's happened? You know, it just we return a family, grandmother and two kids from Mariupol.

And mother disappeared. Maybe she had been killed. And two children disappeared. And we returned them. Because how many in Mariupol parents were killed? Nobody knows. And how many of these children without parents have been kidnapped? We don't know.

And it's a real situation. What happened in different areas, different territories, where Russia are taking parents to the prison and separate with children and children sent to camps or to Russian territory, to Russian families. And it's thousands of children. What are they learning in these camps you talk about? Summer camps or even in schools once they are in Russia. Yeah. And, you know, it's just whole system. And all children, the obligation of parents to send to Russian school and these children should receive and parents Russian passports. Russian passports. It's forcible passportization of all population, and they must obey. If not,

they could be arrested and deported. And the Russian government will separate these kids with their parents and send to the orphanage or send to Russian camp. And we have witnesses, Russian camp. And we have witnesses, and it is many children who were taken from occupied territories to Moscow. It's like excursion for a week to listen Russian propagandist, and they hugely indoctrinate Ukrainian children. Russia says, of course, it's rescuing children, perhaps from the occupied territories. And they're going to have a better life because they'll be out of the conflict. They'll be in Moscow or Russia. What do you think of what they say about what's happening? Yeah, it's Russian narratives. It's huge Russian propaganda all over the world, even in Canada, just to confuse people.

And people think that it's so complicated we will never understand what happened it's not so comfortable to listen what Russia's doing it but it's true that our children are stolen our children experience huge indoctrination and we communicate with the children they telling us they oh maybe we'll stay in Russia because in Ukraine lives Nazi and U.S. and Europe trying to grab Russia. Russia is a victim. They learned this in schools, in Russian schools. And it's very hard to return these children to the understanding of real situation. That's why we need strong support, civilized world, all countries to tell true about this war, because this war against children,

against women, we are fighting not only for territories, because on occupied territories live Ukrainian children, Ukrainian families. We fight for them because we want to return them to normal life, not being slavers of Russia anymore. We've been 100 years. We lost millions of Ukrainian population who've been killed and imprisoned, we won't be free. You mentioned that the Ukrainian government has successfully brought some children, I think you said 500, back to Ukraine. How does that work? How do you get them back? Ukrainian government and the Ukrainian president initiated Bring Kids Back initiative, where 40 countries united and Canada leading in this initiative,

Bring Kids Back, and helping us to identify these children. And we're trying to use all our lives to ask about the help. And different countries try to do something, but negotiate with Putin is very hard because, as you told, he's saving Ukrainian children. By the way, Save Ukraine is a terroristic organization in Russia. And I'm maybe a main terrorist from 2015. I'm a blacklist of Putin as the enemy of Russia because I'm saving Ukrainian children. I'm protecting their rights. That's why all Ukrainians are Nazi, because we're just fighting for our children, for our independence, for our sovereignty. Mikola, what do you hope comes out of the conference you're at

this week? What do you want from the international community? We feel it's urgent that Canada and other allies of Ukraine support and facilitate the effective search, identification, return, rehabilitation, and reintegration of Ukrainian children, ensure coordination among international governmental organizations, international non-governmental organization, and the competent authorities of Ukraine. We feel that our allies and global partners should join us in this time of injustice war in supporting to return our children from Russia and temporary occupied territories and save Ukraine a building on the ground community-based services by providing support of rescue, restore and rebuild children's life. And we need a strong support to help Ukraine

return the children, rehabilitate and reintegrate. Mikola, one more question from me. I heard a lot about this. We all did in the world in the first six to eight months of the war in Ukraine. We heard these terrifying stories. Is it still happening regularly? Yeah, it's happening in occupied territories, in combat zones, and it's horrible. We all time from that families and children who've been returned. Listen to these stories. It's horrible stories of war crimes, crimes against humanity.

And for me, it's all signs of, we heard, a genocide against Ukrainian nation. And the last one. In 2014, 10 years ago, we had more than 8 million children's population. But now we have less than 5. And these were stealing our children. These children, as I told you, 1.5 million in occupied territories in Russia. And many, 2 million almost, children in different countries, in Canada too. And thank you for, I'm so grateful what Canada doing to save our kids. Thank you so much.

Thank you for sharing your story with us. Thank you. Mikola Kuleba is the former Children's Ombudsman of Ukraine, and he is founder of Save Ukraine. In 2017, it felt like drugs were everywhere in the news. So I started a podcast called On Drugs. We covered a lot of ground over two seasons, but there are still so many more stories to tell. I'm Jeff Turner, and I'm back with season three of On Drugs.

And this time, it's going to get personal. I don't know who Sober Jeff is. I don't even know if I like that guy. On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts. Joining me now is Michael Bosurcu. He's a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council who previously worked with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. He's a Canadian, Ukrainian heritage, and today we've reached him in Odessa. Hi, Michael. Hi, Susan. Good to be with you.

You've just heard from Nikola Kuleba about efforts to return Ukrainian children. Clearly, this is a priority for the Zelensky government. Why do you think it's proving so challenging? Well, it's proving so challenging, Well, it's proving so challenging, Susan, because I think the West, many Western leaders are falling for Mr. Putin's bluffs of possibly using nuclear weapons, this sort of thing. So they're afraid to confront him. I mean, Mr. Kuleba, he said things very politely and diplomatically. But I think the only way to put an end to these war crimes, to these forced deportations, to what Ukrainian children are

facing in the occupied territories and in Russia, is to really push back hard against Mr. Putin. You may have heard that the West has finally got its act together to get a $50 billion loan to Ukraine based on frozen Russian assets. Well, at the snap of his fingers, Mr. Putin can come up with a lot more than that. Those types of figures need to be double, triple, quadrupled in order to really show him that the West is serious, that they're going to give Ukraine everything they need to fight back. But that just isn't happening right now. And meanwhile, this children's catastrophe, which I call it, is continuing with at least two children killed every day,

thousands injured, and deprivation of education, separation from families, the list is very long. Michael, you're in Odessa today. You've been there a lot in the last two years. I understand there's some activity there this morning. What's going on? Yeah, well, if you had connected about 45 minutes ago, I would have been talking to you from a bomb shelter. We had two ballistic missiles come to Odessa. I believe there is one death reported already. Odessa. I believe there is one death reported already. And, you know, Susan, these are pretty scary in the sense that the air raid siren goes off. But when these are high speed missiles like

the ones that arrived today, no one has time to reach the bomb shelter. So it's a mix right now of drones and rockets targeting Odessa, as well as many other Ukrainian cities. But I have to remind everyone, I'm just less than a kilometer from the port here. There's a whole lineup of ships here waiting to come in, pick up grain, and take it to world markets, to countries in Africa. And if this is ramped up, it's going to be a lot tougher. This key artery could be cut off once again. Michael, you and I have talked about Ukraine many, many times over the last 10 years, really. How are Ukrainians feeling as we head into yet another winter in this war?

Not very good. I think the mood is quite bleak for a number of reasons. One is, you know, domestically, you know, with winter coming and with up to 80 percent of thermal power plants damaged or destroyed, we're not quite sure how Ukraine is going to cope with providing continuous power and heating to people. In fact, a recent survey says that if the situation doesn't get better, you could have up to eight million, up to 8 million people leave Ukraine for Europe. It's almost impossible to wrap one's head around that, given the numbers are so big. But that's what people fear right now is that they're not going to be able to make it through the winter. And I suspect that the Russians will ramp up their targeting of power plants further. Well, in fact, you know, we heard of another potential escalation for sure.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte confirmed yesterday that North Korean troops are deployed to the Kursk region of Russia where Ukrainian soldiers have a foothold. Let's listen. The deepening military cooperation between Russia and North Korea is a threat to both the Indo-Pacific and Euro-Atlantic security. It undermines peace on the Korean peninsula and fuels the Russian war against Ukraine. Ruto is describing this as a dangerous expansion of Russia's war. What do you think, Michael? this is a dangerous expansion of Russia's war. What do you think, Michael?

Well, what I think is words just don't stop Russian missiles the way Patriot air defense systems do. So a lot of talk from the NATO SG and others, but they have to back it up with actions. And that's the feeling here on the ground in Ukraine. And the number one ask right now, which is not being fulfilled, is to give the Ukrainians the ability to strike key targets in Russia. The exact sites, launch pads, where these Russian missiles that we received today are coming from. But again, I think there's just a weakness among Western leaders to confront Mr. Putin. And you're seeing what's happening with those North Korean troops. This war is being globalized, involving North Korea, having involved Iran and on the periphery, China. And, you know, again, we're not just getting the actions needed. And by the way,

also, of course, more air defense systems are needed because what's happening in Odessa right now, key international arteries should be far, far better protected. Well, and of course, we're all a week away from the U.S. election. It's extremely tight. Support for Ukraine is one of the divisive international issues. Let's listen to Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance from a town hall on the cable channel News Nation on Ukraine last week. handed at J.D. Vance from a town hall on the cable channel News Nation on Ukraine last week. When you talk to, you know, Ukrainian leaders, especially in private, but even in public, they're starting to say this now. They're saying this can't go on forever. They don't have the manpower. They don't have the equipment. They don't have the money. And so I think ultimately,

again, Ukraine is going to have to make that decision. Russia is going to have to, of course, make the decision about what it will do to stop the fighting. But we're going to have to get these guys together. We don't have to like Russia. We don't have to agree with them invading, but we've got to get them together and engage in some real diplomacy or this thing is going to go on forever. Michael, what should we be reading into that comment from J.D. Vance? Well, these are pretty similar to Kremlin key talking points. What wasn't in that clip is what J.D. Vance proposed to end the war in Ukraine. And that includes allowing Russia to keep the territories it has already seized and possibly

even two more blasts, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. It calls for some vague demilitarized zone policed by peacekeepers. And very crucially, which has not gone over well here in Ukraine, is asking Ukraine to drop its NATO bid. So the fear here is that if Mr. Trump does get in, he will either before Inauguration Day or immediately try to come to a deal with Mr. Putin that will not be in Ukraine's favor. So this explains why the mood here is so grim right now. Let's see what happens. But even with due respect to President Biden and his vice president, they have still not shown the resolve that I talked about earlier

that's needed to push Mr. Putin back. And given what you just said, can you and others envision a scenario where the U.S. would withdraw military support? Sadly, yes. And I think part of that has to do with the mood in the United States right now, where a lot of folks are more concerned with their economic well-being, with immigration. And they don't see the United States being the world policeman anymore. That's why I've said for a long time that more of the responsibility for the war in Ukraine is going to fall on the shoulders of the Europeans. And again, that is why, despite the fact that it's only 50 billion,

it's a good sign that they finally have grown the spine to use the interest from those seized Russian assets in Europe to help Ukraine push back Mr. Putin. There was a lot of worry about that earlier, but they finally came around and did it. But as you know, here in Europe as well, changes of governments that are becoming more right-leaning. Look what happened in Georgia the past couple of days

and what could happen in Moldova this weekend. And just staying with the U.S. election for a moment more, there are reports that Elon Musk has had conversations with Vladimir Putin over the last two years, something the Kremlin denies. What do you make of that? Nothing less than a bombshell. Let's remind everyone of who Mr. Musk is. He's one of the most influential players in this election. He's a billionaire. He owns SpaceX, which is sending U.S. satellites, including spy satellites, into space. And he has security clearance.

And if the Wall Street Journal reporting is to be believed, Mr. Putin also asked Mr. Musk to avoid activating his Starlink Internet service over Taiwan as a favor to Xi Jinping. So there you go. That says it all, I think. as a favor to Xi Jinping. So there you go. That says it all, I think. It's an unbelievable kind of development of how some of these tech bros have become such big players in this election and seem to look up to strong men like Mr. Putin.

Unbelievable. Michael, lastly, in the minute and a half we have left, we're four months now away from the three-year anniversary, the three-year mark of this war. Is Russia gaining ground? More bluntly, is Vladimir Putin winning? Well, it doesn't look very good. And the big reason for that is they are making gains on the ground, on the front line. In fact, they're nearing on the city of Pokrovsk. And what is right there is a big coal plant,

which helps Ukraine produce a lot of its steel output, its second biggest export. And if they get that, it said it may have Ukraine's steel production, which would be a big blow to the economy. The other thing that's happening, as we already talked about, the North Koreans getting more involved, Iran, and also China on the sidelines. So it's happening on many, many fronts where the Russians are gaining ground. They're also said to be shrinking that area in Kursk that Ukraine seized earlier this summer. And, you know, he has a work economy at

the snap of his fingers. He can order mobilization. He can also order a lot more money to be devoted. But there is, I mean, the one glimmer of hope for Ukrainians, I guess, is quite a resistance among ordinary Russians to come and fight Ukraine. That's why out of a sign of desperation, he had to go to North Korea. Let's why, out of a sign of desperation, he had to go to North Korea. Let's see what kind of impact that has. It sounds dire again. Michael, thank you so much. My pleasure. Thank you.

Stay safe. Michael Basuku is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, and we reached him today in Odessa.