Researcher reveals: kidnapped child “adopted” by Putin friend

Sergei Mironov, head of the alibi opposition Just Russia party, is on the adoption papers of a two-year-old girl who was kidnapped from the Ukrainian city of Kherson in 2022, according to BBC research. The British broadcaster was able to discover their fate with the help of Ukrainian researcher Viktoria Novikova, who is collecting evidence of the child abductions for the criminal court.

Kidnapped when he was ten months old
Margarita was one of 48 children who went missing after Russian troops captured Kherson last year. She was kidnapped in August 2022 when she was ten months old.

The girl was at the time the youngest resident of a children’s home in Russian-occupied Kherson. The mother gave up custody after the birth, the father was unknown, the BBC reports. The child was taken to the children’s hospital due to bronchitis. There appears a woman who introduced herself as head of the Children’s Department in Moscow.

“It was like a movie”
Shortly afterwards, the hospital received repeated calls from the new Russian head of the children’s home. He demanded that Margarita be returned there immediately. A day after she returned from the hospital, staff were asked to prepare the child for a trip. “We were all scared,” says a nurse at the children’s home. She described Russian men, some in military camouflage pants, one with sunglasses and a briefcase. “It was like being in a movie,” the nurse told the BBC.

Weeks later, in October 2022, Russian Duma deputy Igor Kastyukevich came to the house in Kherson to organize the deportation of the remaining children. Kastyukevtish himself posted a video of the action on his Telegram account, presenting it as a humanitarian mission. According to him, the children in the home were taken “to safety” in Crimea, which has been annexed by Russia since 2014.

For months the BBC tried to locate Margarita and the other 47 children. Researcher Novikova discovered a document showing that the girl was transferred to a hospital in Moscow for medical tests. A woman named Inna Varlamova was also mentioned on the paper. She was identified by a doctor as the mysterious woman who appeared at the hospital in Kherson when the little Ukrainian girl Margarita was being treated there.

On the midnight train to Moscow
Further investigation revealed that Varlamova returned to Ukraine on the same day Margarita was taken from the children’s home. A little later, the Russian woman boarded the midnight train back to Moscow – and everything indicates that she took Margarita with her.

Varlamova is married to Sergei Mironov, head of Fair Russia – a party created to absorb opposition votes but effectively loyal to the Kremlin – and a supporter of Putin. According to the BBC, Varlamova and Mironov appear as parents on the birth certificate of ‘Marina’, who was 14 months old in December 2022. Her birthday is on the same day as Margarita. Adoption papers show the name change and identify Podolsk near Moscow – where Varlamova owns property – as the girl’s birthplace.

Ukraine: 20,000 children kidnapped
Margarita’s fate is one in thousands: according to the Ukrainian government, almost 20,000 children have now been identified who have been abducted by the Russian invaders since the start of the war of aggression in February 2022. The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague has issued an arrest warrant issued against Putin and his children’s rights representative Maria Lwowa-Belowa for these alleged kidnappings. According to the Geneva Convention, it is a war crime to deport civilians without cause in time of war. It is also prohibited to change a child’s marital status.

According to the Russian report, the children are not kidnapped, but taken to safety after the war in Ukraine. According to Lvowa-Belova, there are no adoptions of Ukrainian children. You just take them under supervision or guardianship. However, when asked by the BBC, the Russian government stated that it was ‘incorrect’ that there were no adoptions. These are allowed in the areas that Russia occupies in Ukraine and has now declared its own national territory.

Ukrainian researcher Viktoria Novikova has set herself the goal of finding all the children who disappeared from the children’s home in Kherson. But she fears her trail will soon go cold. “Russian authorities are trying to erase identities by issuing new birth certificates and passports,” she said.

“We have to bring them back”
Moscow has said it will return the children to their families if there is a legal basis to do so and arrest them. But many parents don’t even know where their children are. In Margarita’s case, Novikova was appointed legal representative by the Ukrainian government and she plans to petition Russia to get the child back. “They wanted to wipe them out. We have to bring them back,” she says.