Trump: I believe I could convince Putin to free thousands of kidnapped Ukrainian kids
WASHINGTON — President Trump claimed Friday that he could persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to order the release of thousands of Ukrainian children who have been kidnapped and taken back into Moscow’s territory during the three-year-old European war.“I believe I could, yes.I didn’t know too much about it,” Trump told Fox News Radio host Brian Kilmeade when asked about the prospect during an interview.“I was hearing about it yesterday.
It’s pretty tough stuff, but I believe I could do that.”According to the pro-Kyiv non-profit Razom for Ukraine, Russian forces have abducted 19,546 Ukrainian children since 2022.The United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine reported in 2023, citing media reports and local accounts, that the kids were mainly taken from Russian-occupied territories in the east of Ukraine and moved deeper into the Kremlin’s heartland.Some of the children were given Russian citizenship and were placed in foster care, while others had lost all contact with their rightful families.
.Parents told the UN commission that their children were being treated poorly — including being beaten and forced to wear dirty clothes.The Russian child deportation practices amounted to a “war crime” and violated international humanitarian law, the commission wrote, calling for Moscow to release all Ukrainian deportees and detainees.Some charity operations have successfully returned children to Ukraine, but thousands more remain behind enemy lines.“Russia’s trafficking of Ukrainian children should leave no room for doubt: This invasion has nothing to do with NATO and everything to do with destroying the Ukrainian identity,” Mykola Murskyj, advocacy director of Razom for Ukraine, told The Post Friday.“Trafficking children goes against everything we stand for as America.
We cannot and must not falter in our fight against evil.”Trump has praised Putin for wanting to find “peace” — while bashing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Z...