LUGANSK, June 4. /TASS/. More than 20 children from the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) have returned from Ukraine and reunited with their families through the efforts of the Russian presidential commissioner for children’s rights since 2023, regional children’s rights commissioner Inna Shvenk told TASS.

"In 2023, we helped 17 children [from the LPR] reunite with their parents. In 2024, we facilitated the reunion of six kids with their relatives as part of cooperation with Maria Lvova-Belova (Russian presidential commissioner for children’s rights - TASS). <...> It’s great that the children will now live with and be brought up by their parents," she specified.

Shvenk pointed out that work to reunite families was carried out based on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s order. The office of the LPR children’s rights commissioner is currently handling three family reunion requests, with children expected to return to their families from the Kiev-controlled territories before the end of the year.

The LPR official added that most commonly, children were separated from their legal representatives during evacuation from combat zones. "Most often, it’s families that left for Ukraine in 2014. Some [children] went there with grandparents. So now, they are there but their parents are here. In such cases, the parents file a request for assistance in reuniting with their kids. Or it’s the other way around, when the parents left, leaving their children here with their grandparents," Shvenk explained.

She also said that the presidential commissioner for children’s rights reunited families after parents or other legal representatives reached out to the regional ombudsperson.

The LPR People’s Council (parliament) passed a law establishing the post of the regional children’s rights commissioner in November 2022. Shvenk took the position in December 2022.