“A child’s soul knows no borders, no flags,” said First Lady Melania Trump during a Friday announcement about the reunification of eight children displaced by Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine.
She said the children had been reunited with their families over the previous 24 hours.
Melania explained that she reached out to Russian Federation Vladimir Putin last August in a letter seeking help for children impacted by the invasion. Within one month of the start of the invasion in February 2022, more than half of the 7.5 million children in Ukraine had been displaced, according to United Nations estimates.
Over the summer, President Donald Trump revealed a bit about his wife’s concerns about the ongoing war, and her thoughts about Putin, in a quip.
“I go home, I tell the first lady: ‘I spoke with Vladimir today. We had a wonderful conversation,’” Trump said. “She said: ‘Oh really? Another city was just hit.’”
Ukrainians on social media were quick to pick up on this. One post read: “So all this time Melania was for us?” Melania’s native country, Slovenia, also supports Ukraine.
However, Melania said that she wanted to work with Putin to help children affected by the war. After her letter to the Russian leader last summer, she said an “open channel of communication” was established.
“For the past three months, both sides have participated in several backchannel meetings and calls, all in good faith,” Melania said.
This week, she said these efforts bore fruit.
“Each child has lived in turmoil because of the war in Ukraine,” said Melania. “Three were separated from their parents and displaced to the Russian Federation because of frontline fighting. The other five were separated from family members across borders because of the conflict.”
Reuters reported Friday that 23 Ukrainian children and adolescents trapped in Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine had been brought to areas under Ukrainian control, highlighting the ongoing problem. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, one third of the Ukrainian population remained displaced due to the war as of this February.
Millions of homes have been destroyed, leaving people without a home to return to. Inside Ukraine, conditions also remain dangerous – between March and May of this year alone an estimated 222 children were killed or injured as fighting continued, per UNICEF.
“Since the start of the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation in Ukraine on 24 February 2022, HRMMU has documented at least 14,116 civilians killed, including 733 children, and 36,481 injured, including 2,285 children,” said the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine last month.
Melania said that this week’s reunification effort is the start of a larger initiative. The first lady wants to help reunify all children displaced by the war.
“Russia has demonstrated a willingness to disclose objective and detailed information reflective for the current situation,” she said, adding that it provided biographies and photos of the children.
Melania did not take questions after her announcement.
“Plans are already underway to reunify more children in the immediate future,” she said in conclusion. “I hope peace will come soon. It will begin with our children.”