US to restore funding short-term to track abducted Ukrainian children
The State Department said it would restore funding to an initiative tracking Ukrainian children abducted to Russia.
- The U.S. State Department is temporarily funding an initiative documenting the abduction of Ukrainian children after initially pausing the program.
- Nonprofits and Democratic lawmakers are urging the Trump administration to fully restore the program and express concern over the potential loss of data about the abducted children.
- Ukraine calls the abductions a war crime and genocide, while Russia claims it is evacuating people voluntarily and protecting vulnerable children.
The U.S. State Department said on Thursday it would give short-term funding to an initiative documenting abducted Ukrainian children, after President Donald Trump's administration decided to pause the program on January 25.
The U.S. government-funded initiative led by Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab helped track thousands of Ukrainian children abducted by Russia.
Members of Common Man for Ukraine, a small New Hampshire-based humanitarian nonprofit told Paste BN on Friday that more ‒ not less ‒ needs to be done to help these children.
"The kids who have been abducted by Russia and subjected to reeducation deserve to be found," said Susan Mathison, a Common Man for Ukraine co-founder, currently on a mission in southeastern Ukraine. "We need to do everything we can to work together to get them home."
The decision to terminate the program, called the Ukraine Conflict Observatory, came after Trump ordered a broad review to prevent what he says is wasteful spending of U.S. taxpayer dollars with causes that do not align with American interests.
But the administration has reconsidered its view of this program, as Trump acknowledged to reporters at the Oval Office on Friday, "A lot of children are living in Russia right now. That's a horrible situation."
Ukraine says more than 19,500 children have been taken to Russia or Russian-occupied territory during the war in Ukraine without the consent of family or guardians, calling the abductions a war crime that meets the U.N. treaty definition of genocide.
Russia has said it has been evacuating people voluntarily and to protect vulnerable children from the war zone.
"Funding is being provided for a short period while the Conflict Observatory implementers ensure the proper transfer of the critical data on the children to the appropriate authorities," a State Department spokesperson said on Thursday. "It is part of the standard close-out procedures for terminated programs."
American-based nonprofit pleads for initiative to remain intact
On Friday, members of Common Man for Ukraine, which funds trauma counseling, healing retreats and aid convoys, publicly pleaded for the U.S. initiative to be further extended.
"A six-week extension is not enough. The search program must continue," Mathison said. "Our humanitarian work focuses on delivering a brighter future for Ukrainian children, and for all of us, that must mean returning all of the kidnapped children to their true homeland."
Mathison is among several members of the U.S.-based nonprofit who are in southeastern Ukraine this weekend, delivering more than 64,000 pounds of food, clothing, generators and other critical supplies to more than 5,000 children and their families.
It is the Common Man for Ukraine's 12th trip to the area as the nonprofit has raised more than $4 million since the full-scale war began three years ago.
Will the public pleas to keep the program be enough?
Earlier this month, Democratic lawmakers called on the Trump administration to restore the program. Numerous aid organizations, big and small, globally fear for the mental and physical well-being of a reported more than 5 million Ukrainian children who've had their lives disrupted because of the war.
The initiative's end has raised concerns about the potential loss of access to a trove of information, including satellite imagery and other data, about some 30,000 children taken from Ukraine.
"There are allegations that some of this data has been destroyed," Mathison said Friday. "If so, we've destroyed children's lives."
In March 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and his children's rights commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova over the deportation of the children. Russia denounced the warrants as "outrageous and unacceptable."
Lisa Mure, another co-founder of Common Man for Ukraine, echoed similar sentiments late Friday. Mure said she can't imagine what it would be like to have a neighboring country steal American kids and raise them as their own.
"From our experience on the ground these past three years, Ukrainian children are strong, pure-hearted and resilient," Mure said. "Anything we can do to support Ukraine and its children in this time of existential crisis is what we should be doing as Americans."
Dr. Irwin Redlener, co-founder of the Ukraine Children’s Action Project, a New York-based nonprofit that also provides humanitarian aid to Ukraine, told Paste BN on Friday he thinks the number of Ukrainian kids abducted is higher than the nearly 20,000 being reported.
"It's unimaginable. I think it's far more and it's demoralizing to their country," Redlener said. "It's so hard to fathom."
Reuters contributed to this report.
(This story has been updated to add new information.)