Four-year-old girl reunited with father after evacuation from Russian-occupied territory

Ukrainian human rights activists have assisted a four-year-old girl in evacuating from temporarily Russian-occupied territory and reuniting with her father. The child had been living in a city captured by Russia since the start of the full-scale war, where she remained with her grandmother despite her father's persistent but unsuccessful efforts to evacuate them.

Source: Daria Zarivna, Chief Operating Officer of the Bring Kids Back UA initiative

Quote: "Little Marichka was only one year old when the full-scale war began. She was with her grandmother in a city that came under Russian occupation during the first days of the invasion. Her childhood, which should have been the happiest time in her life, turned into a nightmare due to the lack of water and electricity, constant shelling and the threat of deportation by the occupation authorities." 

Details:The child’s father, who was on territory controlled by Ukraine, had tried to arrange evacuation himself for a long time, but to no avail.

"Eventually, he reached out to the Ukrainian Child Rights Network, which helped organise a safe route and accompanied the child until she was reunited with her father," Zarivna noted.

As of March 2025, a total of 1,247 children have been brought back to Ukraine. At the same time, at least 1.6 million children are still living under Russian occupation.

Background: Earlier, it was reported that a 16-year-old Ukrainian teenager had been abducted by Russian forces from Kherson and sent to a so-called "re-education camp". The boy openly resisted and at one point took down the Russian flag from a flagpole and replaced it with his underwear.

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