The Russian envoy said the two ‘discussed various forms of further cooperation with the U.N. and other international organizations’ to protect children.
The U.N. leadership’s top representative for children’s rights met with a Russian official accused of overseeing the mass deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, a war crime for which she has been indicted by the International Criminal Court.
While the U.N. declined to confirm that the meeting took place, Maria Lvova-Belova, the indicted Russian official, revealed that she met Virginia Gamba, the U.N. representative, earlier today.
According to Lvova-Belova, the two envoys share more in common than many would expect.
“The conversation turned out to be constructive and sincere – without politics. After all, we are united by a sense of personal responsibility for the life and safety of children,” Lvova-Belova wrote in a post today to her Telegram channel about the meeting in Moscow.
She added that she and Gamba also “discussed various forms of further cooperation with the U.N. and other international organizations” to protect children.
National Review was first to report on Gamba’s plan to meet Lvova-Belova yesterday, revealing that envoys from several outraged countries confronted the team of U.N. secretary-general Antonio Guterres on Wednesday night, demanding answers about the meeting. A diplomatic source said the U.N. failed to explain why a meeting between Gamba and Lvova-Belova would be so necessary as to grant legitimacy to an individual facing war-crimes charges.
A joint project between Yale University and the State Department found that Lvova-Belova oversees a vast system of “re-education” camps to which at least 6,000 Ukrainian children deported from Russian-occupied territory have been sent. The researchers characterized this figure as a conservative estimate, indicating that the true number is likely to be much larger.
The study also found that the Russian authorities appear to be carrying out “systematic re-education” of Ukrainian children in dozens of those camps, to promote a pro-Kremlin worldview. Though the report didn’t find evidence of abuse or mistreatment within the camps, the very act of deporting the population of a country during conflict is a war crime.
When the International Criminal Court indicted Vladimir Putin in March for war crimes carried out in Ukraine by Russian forces, it also produced a war-crimes indictment for Lvova-Belova over her role in the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia.
“Lvova-Belova belongs only in one place — in the dock at the ICC — to answer charges of heinous crimes committed in Ukraine,” Balkees Jarrah, associate director of Human Rights Watch’s International Justice Program, told NR yesterday about the planned meeting.
A U.N. spokesman said that while he couldn’t confirm any of Gamba’s meetings before she issues an upcoming public report, such a meeting with Lvova-Belova would be appropriate.
“Regarding Ms. Lvova-Belova, I would only add the point that the individual in question has the responsibility within the Russian Federation for important areas of Ms. Gamba’s mandate. It is important for Ms. Gamba to be able to meet with relevant officials in order to further her work regarding the protection of children,” said Farhan Haq, the U.N.’s deputy spokesman.
But as further details about the meeting become public knowledge, a number of countries are taking public their outrage about the U.N.’s outreach to an alleged war criminal.
“It would be deeply concerning if a senior UN diplomat would meet with a fugitive subject to an ICC arrest warrant for committing war crimes against children,” a U.S. official told NR today. The State Department’s top international war-crimes official, Beth Van Schaak, echoed that sentiment on Twitter this afternoon.