Ukraine-Russia struggle newest: Putin’s planes ‘stole Ukrainian children’ as UK considers sending troops to struggle

Russian presidential aircraft and funds were used in a program that took children from occupied Ukrainian territories, stripped them of Ukrainian identity and placed them with Russian families, according to a report by Yale’s School of Public Health.

The US State Department-backed research, published yesterday, identified 314 Ukrainian children taken to Russia in the early months of the war in Ukraine as part of what it says was a systematic, Kremlin-funded program to “Russify” them.

In March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Russian president Vladimir Putin and his child rights’ commissioner, Maria Lvova-Belova, for the alleged war crime of deportation of Ukrainian children.

The new research, reported first by Reuters, offers details of the alleged deportation programme and individuals involved, including what its lead researcher said were new links to Putin.

The researcher, Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab, said he was scheduled to present the findings to the UN security council today. The US holds the rotating presidency of the 15-member body this month.

Mr Raymond said the research offers evidence that would support additional charges by the ICC against Putin of “forcible transfer” of people from one national and ethnic group to another.

He further said the report proved “the deportation of Ukraine‘s children is part of a systematic, Kremlin-led program” to make them citizens of Russia.

Forcible transfer is a crime against humanity under international law. Because they must be widespread and systematic, crimes against humanity are considered more serious than war crimes.

Russia’s air defence units were trying to repel a Ukrainian drone attack on Novorossiisk, the head of the Russian Black Sea port said this morning.

Novorossiisk is one of Russia’s most important oil export gateways.

“Air defence is operating in Novorossiisk,” Andrei Kravchenko, the head of the Novorossiisk municipality, said on his Telegram messaging channel. “All emergency services have been put on combat alert.”

Volodymyr Zelensky called for major reinforcement of sectors in eastern Ukraine of the 1,000-km (600-mile) frontline, where Russian forces have made consistent gains in recent months.

Analysts and war bloggers say that Russian forces in the east are advancing at the fastest rate since the early days of the February 2022 invasion.

Mr Zelensky issued his appeal as Russia’s defence ministry said its troops had captured two new frontline villages – one in Donetsk region, the main focus of the 33-month-old war, the other further south in Zaporizhzhia region.

The president was speaking in his nightly video address after a discussion with Ukraine‘s top commander, Oleksandr Syrskyi. He said much depended on Ukraine‘s Western allies providing vital weaponry in a timely manner.

“The Donetsk directions require significant reinforcement. This particularly involves the supply of weapons from our partners,” Mr Zelensky said.

“It’s a direct relationship: The greater our army’s firepower and technological capabilities, the more we can destroy Russia’s offensive potential and protect the lives of our soldiers.”

The key, he said, was to boost Ukraine‘s long-range capabilities, partly by boosting domestic weapons production.

The United States, the biggest supplier of military aid to Ukraine, announced its latest military aid package on Monday, valued at some $725m. But Ukraine is concerned about the continued flow of weapons under president-elect Donald Trump, who has pledged to put a quick end to the war.

James Nixey of the Chatham House think-tank has warned that any part of Ukraine being in Nato would be unacceptable to Vladimir Putin, after Volodymyr Zelensky said he could accept territory being temporarily ceded to Russia in exchange for security assurances from the alliance.

“After all, [Nato] is, for him, an abhorrence. Putin doesn’t want a pause anyway – he believes he’s on the brink of an historic and strategic victory, kindly deal-sealed by Donald Trump,” Mr Nixey told The Independent.

Vladimir Putin and his Belarusian counterpart, Alexander Lukashenko, will sign a landmark security pact on Friday that reflects global geopolitical changes, Russian state news agency RIA has said.

The agreement will be among the documents the leaders are set to sign in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, on the 25th anniversary of the Union State, a borderless union and alliance between the two former Soviet republics and neighbours.

“We are covering the topics of state, public, economic security, talking about ensuring stability in the development of our economies,” the agency quoted Belarusian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Nazaruk as saying.

“It is designed to take into account the changed external conditions, when the world is moving to a polycentric world order,” he added, describing what he called a “landmark” agreement.

As president, Lukashenko has kept Belarus in a firm authoritative grip for the past three decades, and been a loyal ally of Putin, allowing his territory to be used as a launch pad for Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

The Russian Defence Ministry has said its forces had gained control of two new settlements, Romanivka in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, and Novodarivka, in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region.

The Independent could not verify this claim.