US Announces Short-Term Funding For Program Tracking Ukrainian Children Abducted By Russia

(MENAFN- UkrinForm) The U.S. State Department said on Thursday that short-term funding was being given to an initiative documenting abducted Ukrainian children, after Republican President Donald Trump's administration decided to pause the program on January 25.

That's according to Reuters , Ukrinform reports.

"Funding is being provided for a short period while the Conflict Observatory implementers ensure the proper transfer of the critical data on the children to the appropriate authorities. It is part of the standard close-out procedures for terminated programs," a State Department spokesperson said on Thursday.

Earlier in March, Democratic lawmakers called on the Trump administration to restore the program.

The program's end raised concerns about the potential loss of access to a trove of information, including satellite imagery and other data, about some 30,000 children taken from Ukraine.

The U.S. government-funded initiative led by Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab helped track thousands of Ukrainian children abducted by Russia.

The decision to terminate the program, called the Ukraine Conflict Observatory, came after Trump ordered a broad review to prevent what he says is wasteful spending of U.S. taxpayer dollars with causes that do not align with American interests.

In March 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and his children's rights commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova over the deportation of the children. Russia denounced the warrants as "outrageous and unacceptable."

Read also: Musk's DOGE shuts funding for taskforce searching for Russia-abducted Ukrainian children - media

Earlier reports said that the White House's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk, had stopped funding Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab, which had been helping search for Ukrainian children abducted by Russia.

A group of Democratic lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives urged the Trump administration to reinstate the program that helps search for Ukrainian children abducted by Russia. In a joint letter, they pointed out that the decision meant researchers lost access to a large amount of information, including satellite images and other data about around 30,000 children taken from Ukraine.

Reuters, citing sources, reported that the termination of the State Department's contract with Yale HRL led to the deletion of evidence of war crimes worth $26 million, which could have helped protect Putin.

Last week, the State Department denied media reports claiming that data on Ukrainian children deported by Russia was deleted after funding for the Yale University project, which helped search for them, was cut.

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