The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) will hold a hearing on September 22 in a case concerning ten Ukrainian children from childcare institutions in Crimea whose whereabouts have been unknown since 2014.
According to a press release issued by the ECHR and cited by Ukrinform, the hearing will concern the individual application “Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union on behalf of ten children v. Russia” (Application No. 6719/23).
The case involves ten Ukrainian children who were living in childcare institutions in Crimea when Russia occupied and illegally annexed the peninsula in 2014.
According to the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union (UHHRU), the children were forcibly granted Russian citizenship and subsequently entered into Russia’s adoption system, where they may have been adopted. Their whereabouts have remained unknown since 2014 despite repeated inquiries by the Ukrainian authorities. The UHHRU argues that the circumstances may amount to the enforced disappearance of children.
The case is linked to events in Crimea in 2014, which the ECHR also examined in the interstate case Ukraine v. Russia (re Crimea).
Margarita Sokorenko, Ukraine’s Agent before the ECHR at the Ministry of Justice, said in a Facebook post that the case was closely connected to the interstate proceedings Ukraine had brought against Russia before the Court.
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She noted that in the 2024 judgment in Ukraine v. Russia (re Crimea), the ECHR had confirmed the existence of an administrative practice of violations of the European Convention on Human Rights in occupied Crimea, finding that those violations had persisted continuously since 2014.
Sokorenko also recalled that in the 2025 case Ukraine and the Netherlands v. Russia, the Grand Chamber had examined Russia’s abduction of Ukrainian children from occupied territories since 2014 as part of a pattern of Russia’s systemic crimes.
As reported by Ukrinform, the ECHR in May began considering two applications filed against Russia by Ukrainian journalist and former political prisoner from Crimea, Iryna Danylovych.
