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The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has scheduled a September 22 hearing in a case involving ten Ukrainian children from Crimean childcare facilities whose whereabouts remain unknown since 2014.
According to an ECHR press release cited by UATV English, the hearing concerns an individual application titled “Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union on behalf of ten children v. Russia” (Application No. 6719/23).
The children in question were residents of childcare institutions in Crimea at the time Russia occupied and illegally annexed the peninsula in 2014. The Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union (UHHRU) alleges that the children were forcibly given Russian citizenship and subsequently placed into Russia’s adoption system, where they may have been adopted out. Despite repeated attempts by Ukrainian authorities to locate them, their whereabouts have remained unknown ever since. UHHRU contends that these circumstances could constitute enforced disappearance of children.
This case connects to the broader events in Crimea in 2014 that the ECHR previously examined in the interstate case Ukraine v. Russia (re Crimea).
Margarita Sokorenko, Ukraine’s Agent before the ECHR at the Ministry of Justice, noted on Facebook that this case is closely tied to the interstate proceedings Ukraine has pursued against Russia at the Court.
She pointed to the ECHR’s 2024 ruling in Ukraine v. Russia (re Crimea), which confirmed an ongoing administrative practice of human rights violations in occupied Crimea, determining that these violations had continued without interruption since 2014.
Sokorenko also referenced the 2025 case Ukraine and the Netherlands v. Russia, in which the Grand Chamber examined Russia’s abduction of Ukrainian children from occupied territories as part of a broader pattern of systemic crimes.
As previously reported, the ECHR began reviewing two separate applications against Russia in May, filed by Ukrainian journalist and former Crimean political prisoner Iryna Danylovych.
Read also: UN: Russian Attacks Killed 265 Civilians in Ukraine in June
