Alexander Lukashenko said that Belarus will continue to bring children from the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine “for recovery”. He said this during a meeting with employees of organizations at the Minsk airport.
“And we agreed with Putin that we will finance these trips from the union budget. We have done this and will continue to do this, without looking at any reproaches,” he said.
Lukashenka considers “ridiculous” the efforts of Western countries to prosecute Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose arrest warrant was issued by the International Criminal Court in March last year. He is charged with the illegal deportation of children from the occupied territories of Ukraine to Russia. And in July, MEPs called on the ICC to consider issuing an arrest warrant for Lukashenka.
“It’s just ridiculous, I’m absolutely not worried about it,” Lukashenka said.
Rehabilitation of children from the occupied part of Ukraine is carried out on behalf of Lukashenka, the organization of their accommodation in Belarus is organized by the Talaya Foundation with the support of Belaruskali OJSC and the Union State. Talay himself said that a request to provide such support in the rehabilitation of children was addressed to his foundation by a “public figure from Zaporozhye” Vladimir Rogov, a pro-Russian activist, the so-called representative of the council of the military-civilian administration of the Zaporozhye region appointed by the Russian authorities. The head of the Belarusian Red Cross Society Dmitry Shevtsov also takes part in the removal of children.
Belarusian diplomat, leader of the People’s Anti-Crisis Directorate (NAU) Pavel Latushko drew attention to the fact that children who come to Belarus from the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories are minors, aged from six to 15 years, often they are orphans or have lost their breadwinner. And this means, Latushko emphasizes, that only the authorized body for the citizenship of these children has the right to leave, and Ukraine is such an body.
Pavel Latushko believes that in this case the Fourth Geneva Convention and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which states that the illegal deportation of children during the war is a crime, could have been violated.
The head of the Belarusian Red Cross confirmed that the organization is involved in the removal of children from the occupied Ukrainian territories to Belarus:
