Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand opened a two-day international conference in Toronto on Monday aimed at bringing home tens of thousands of Ukrainian children that Kyiv says Russia has abducted since its 2022 invasion, and at freeing thousands of civilians and prisoners of war still held in Russian custody.
Canada is co-hosting the summit, titled “Pathways to Peace: Second International Conference on Returning Ukrainian Children, Detained Civilians and Prisoners of War,” alongside Ukraine and Norway, according to a Global Affairs Canada release. Foreign ministers, senior officials from allied countries and non-governmental organizations are attending, along with Ukrainians who were themselves held in Russian captivity before being returned.
The numbers behind the gathering show how far the effort still has to go. Ukrainian authorities have documented 20,651 possible cases of children unlawfully deported or forcibly transferred since the invasion began, according to conference materials cited by Global News, and just 2,573 of them, about one in eight, have been brought home. A further 1,878 civilians are confirmed to be unlawfully detained, though Ukraine and its allies believe the true number could run as high as 20,000. Roughly 9,529 Ukrainian military personnel and civilians had been returned from Russian captivity as of August, separate from the children’s cases.
Monday’s meeting builds on a coalition Canada helped launch in Kyiv in February 2024, which now includes 51 countries and organizations co-chaired by Canada and Ukraine. That coalition traces its momentum to a summit Canada hosted in Montreal in October 2024, where allied governments first pledged to coordinate the search for deported children, according to CBC News reporting at the time. Two years on, this week’s Toronto conference is meant to measure what that pledge has actually delivered: better coordination on returns, stronger protection for children and civilians still inside Russian-held territory, support for the mental-health and reintegration needs of those who make it home, and continued efforts to hold Russia accountable.
Accountability has a legal dimension that predates the coalition. The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants in March 2023 for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s children’s rights commissioner, accusing them of the war crime of unlawfully deporting and transferring children out of occupied Ukrainian territory. Russia has denied wrongdoing and says it moved children for their safety, but rights groups and Ukrainian officials describe a systematic effort to place deported children with Russian families and pressure them to abandon their Ukrainian identity and language.
The choice of Toronto is not incidental. Canada is home to roughly 1.26 million people of Ukrainian descent, the world’s third-largest Ukrainian population outside Ukraine and Russia itself, according to the 2021 census. Ottawa has framed its role in the coalition as part of a broader commitment that now totals more than $26 billion in support to Ukraine since the invasion began, including $750 million earmarked for recovery and reconstruction, according to Global Affairs Canada.
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul, also attending the conference, warned this week that Russian interference is spreading beyond Ukraine’s borders into NATO territory, a reminder that allies are treating the children’s cases as tied to broader security concerns rather than a stand-alone humanitarian file.
The conference continues Tuesday, when participants are expected to detail next steps for identifying children still in Russian custody and expanding the network of countries funding tracing and reunification work. What comes out of those closed-door sessions, and whether it moves a return rate still stuck near one in eight, will show whether Monday’s renewed pledges carry more weight than the one made in Montreal two years ago.
Via Global News and CP24 (Canadian Press). Read the original reporting: Global News and CP24.
