Four children abducted from a children’s home in Kherson in 2022 are being listed for adoption on a Russian state portal, usynovite.rf, according to a joint investigation by the television and online network Nastoyashchee Vremya and The Reckoning Project. The listings are reportedly active until March 2026.
The profiles published on the portal do not indicate that the children are from Kherson or that they are Ukrainian.
While the identities and personal details of the children are concealed for security reasons, the information is available to the editorial team conducting the investigation.
According to reports, the Russian occupying authorities abducted two children from the Kherson children’s home in September 2022, followed by an additional 46 children on October 21, 2022. Sources indicate that ten of these children have been returned to Ukraine, but the majority remain in Russian foster families.
Earlier investigations by the Russian publication Vazhnie Istorii revealed that one girl, Margarita Prokopenko, abducted from the Kherson home, was adopted by Sergey Mironov, a Russian deputy and leader of the Just Russia party. Additionally, reports from The New York Times have identified profiles of children from the Kherson children’s home in a Russian database.
Official Ukrainian sources estimate that over 20,000 Ukrainian children have been taken to Russia or occupied territories during the ongoing conflict. Ukrainian Human Rights Commissioner Dmytro Lubinets has suggested that around 150,000 children may have been unlawfully removed, while the Commissioner for Children’s Rights, Daria Gerasimchuk, has cited figures ranging from 200,000 to 300,000.
As of December 4, 2025, the Office of the Prosecutor General reported that 1,876 of the abducted children have been successfully returned to their homes.
In March 2023, the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russian Children’s Ombudsman Maria Lvova-Belova, who are suspected of committing war crimes, including the forced deportation and relocation of children from occupied Ukrainian territories.
In July 2023, Maria Lvova-Belova claimed that Russia had ‘accepted’ approximately 4.8 million residents from Ukraine since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, including over 700,000 children. She asserted that most of these children had arrived in Russia with their parents or other relatives.
A Russian state portal has begun listing four abducted children from Kherson for adoption, raising concerns about the ongoing abduction of Ukrainian children during the conflict. Investigations reveal that many children remain in Russian foster care, with significant numbers still unaccounted for.