Three children abducted by Russia will be returned to Ukraine via Qatar, — Reuters.

Citing a representative of the Qatari authorities, the agency reports that three Ukrainian children will be handed over to diplomats in Moscow this week in accordance with the mechanism created by Qatar. It is about a two-year-old boy, a nine-year-old boy and a 17-year-old girl.

According to a Qatari official, the return of these children will be a test of the system that the state created after months of secret negotiations with Moscow and Kyiv. Qatar's Minister of State for International Cooperation, Lolwa Al Khater, confirmed the mediation and called this week's repatriation "just the first step."

Russian Children's Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova, who is accused of facilitating the abduction of children from Ukraine, shared a short list of Ukrainian children who must be returned to a group of Qatari diplomats. They checked the identity of each child.

The representative of Qatar noted that it is currently unclear how many more children the Russian Federation will allow to return to Ukraine through the Qatari mechanism.

According to him, Qatari diplomats will accompany the children across the border with Estonia, Latvia or Belarus or to Qatar on a charter plane before returning to Ukraine.