Last week, the Save Ukraine team rescued 33 children and teenagers from occupation. This was made possible thanks to the support of our partners within the framework of the President of Ukraine’s Bring Kids Back UA initiative. Each of them endured psychological pressure, intimidation, and attempts to erase their identity, but the worst is finally behind them.

Among the rescued:

🔹 16-year-old Illia, who survived a brutal armed assault by drunken Russian soldiers in his own home. The teenager was forced to attend an occupation school, where teachers would call the military police over any minor issue, and soldiers regularly showed up to classes to teach the children how to assemble weapons and operate combat drones.

🔹 17-year-old Oleksiy, who was forced under threat to attend an occupation school. During classes, teenagers were recruited to become drone operators, and recently, the young man was forcibly registered for military service. He lived in constant fear of Russian soldiers who would break in for searches and point their assault rifles at civilians just for fun.

🔹 8-year-old Dina, who was threatened with being taken to an orphanage if she didn’t attend a Russian school. Instead of learning, the children were forced to draw cards for Russian soldiers. The girl lived in constant fear due to frequent armed searches of her home and drones hunting people on the streets.

For these and 30 other children, the occupation is now in the past. Today, they are safe—undergoing rehabilitation at our Hope and Healing Centers, receiving psychological support and assistance with documents so they can start with a clean slate.

Our fight continues, as thousands of Ukrainian children still remain hostages of an enemy system that is trying to weaponize them.

🙏🏻 Thank you to our partners Wladimir Klitschko, Tatjana Kiel, #WeAreAllUkrainians, Helping To Leave, and the Joint Center for Coordinating the Search and Release—together, we are bringing children home.

Thanks to Save Ukraine, over 1,800 children are already home.