Melania Trump says 8 children are reunited with families after ongoing talks with Putin

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Melania Trump announced Friday that eight children displaced by the Russia-Ukraine war have been reunited with their families following ongoing talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The first lady in August wrote to Putin and had her husband hand-deliver the letter when he held a summit with the Russian president in Alaska.

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has resulted in Russia taking Ukrainian children out of their country so they can be raised as Russian.

The first lady, speaking at the White House on Friday, said that after Putin responded to her letter they established an “open channel of communication” regarding the welfare of those children.

“We have agreed to cooperate with each other for the benefit of all people involved in this war,” she said.

Both sides have participated in several back-channel meetings and calls over the past three months, and one of her representatives has been working directly with Putin's team to “ensure the safe reunification of children with their families," she said.

Melania Trump's announcement came as President Donald Trump's own efforts to broker an end to Putin’s war in Ukraine have stalled, and he repeatedly has expressed frustration over the setback along what he describes as his disappointment with Russia's leader.

The Associated Press documented the grabbing of Ukrainian children in 2022, after which the International Criminal Court said it had issued an arrest warrant for Putin for war crimes, accusing him of personal responsibility for the abductions of children from Ukraine.

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This story has been corrected to show first lady Melania Trump said there were eight children, not eight Ukrainian children, reunited with their families.