UNITED NATIONS, November 10. /TASS/. The approach of Western countries toward Ukrainian children exposes their double standards, Russia's envoy to the UN Vasily Nebenzya said at an informal UN Security Council Arria Formula Meeting.

"We would also appreciate an answer to the question of what is the fundamental difference between these children [who were evacuated to Europe] and those evacuated to Russia from the war zone by Russian authorities and humanitarian organizations. Why is temporary guardianship or temporary custody over Ukrainian children by Russian families presented as forced adoption, while similar placement in European families is presented as caring for the best interests of the child. This is yet another example of double standards cultivated by Western countries," he said.

Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry described the US State Department's report titled "The Kremlin's war against Ukrainian children" as an outright lie. The ministry said "this set of falsehoods had been previously migrating from one leading Anglo-Saxon media outlet to another at the behest of the Kiev regime and the Western PR firms in its service." The ministry also said Russia does not have a program for adopting children from the area of the special military operation, and it’s inaccurate to say that the number of adopted children is in the thousands.