Ukrainian boy is reunited with family after eight months in Russia

By Sergiy Karazy

KYIV (Reuters) -In January, Dmytro, a 13-year-old Ukrainian boy whose family had fled the war to Finland, walked into Russia after being persuaded to do so by online gamers.

Interrogated at the border, he then spent more than eight months in a Russian children's home before being reunited with his mother in Kyiv.

Dmytro, who was returned to Kyiv earlier this month along with half a dozen children, was one of around 19,500 young Ukrainians who Ukrainian officials say are being held in Russia against their will.

His story is unusual in that he chose to go there, albeit under the influence of people he met online. Rights advocates say many Ukrainian children held in Russia have been deported and put up for adoption but are hoping that more can be returned. The Kremlin says it is protecting them from conflict.

'WHY DON'T YOU LIVE IN RUSSIA?'

In the early months of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Dmytro and other family members, who asked not to be fully identified, fled in the only direction they could - to Russia - as Russian troops moved in on the port city of Mariupol. Volunteer groups then helped the family make it to Finland, where they found refuge.

Dmytro, however, felt alienated by the different culture and language. One day in January, instead of coming home from school, he walked 9 km (five miles) to the border, eluded Finnish border guards and crossed through a forest.

When he got to the Russian side of the border, he was detained, he said.

"They (the Russians) tightened the handcuffs on me so much that my wrists were swollen. They pressed my shoulder to the ground with the muzzle of an automatic rifle, not allowing me to stand up."

After hours of interrogation he was sent to a children's shelter in St. Petersburg. By then he had changed his mind about staying in Russia but he was too afraid to say so.

"The Russians would come and ask: 'Why don't you like Russia? Why don't you live in Russia? After you turn 18 you can study and work here,'" he said. "I just agreed with them and said 'Of course, of course, sure.' I just waited to go home."

After speaking to his mother in the weekly phone calls he was allowed, she spoke to officials at the shelter for three months with no results, and appealed to the ombudsmen in both Ukraine and Russia.

"Kyiv and Moscow started working together directly," she said. "Thanks to that, I was able to take my child home after eight months."

Accompanied on a train to Moscow, then by plane to Minsk in neighbouring Belarus, the boy was able to go to Kyiv, where his mother had returned from Finland to meet him.

Russia has repeatedly denied deporting Ukrainian children throughout the more than 3-1/2-year-old war, saying it has acted to keep them safe from the fighting.

The International Criminal Court in The Hague issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Commissioner for Children's Rights Maria Lvova-Belova, accusing them of unlawful deportation of children, a war crime.

Russia does not recognise the jurisdiction of the court. Lvova-Belova did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the statements by Dmytro and his mother about his time in Russia.

U.S. first lady Melania Trump has said that since her husband passed on a letter from her to Putin at their summit in August, she and the Russian leader have an "open channel of communication" about the welfare of the war's child victims.

Ukrainian officials said they hoped it would bring results. "The only result we want is for our children to be returned to Ukrainian-controlled territory," said Oksana Chervyakova, representative of Ukraine's Ombudsman for children's rights.

(Reporting by Sergiy Karazy, Writing by Ron Popeski; editing by Tom Balmforth and Philippa Fletcher)