Key facts
- Kazakh authorities detained Ukrainian citizen Liubov Rozhanska at Astana airport on October 1.
- Rozhanska was detained at the request of Russian authorities, according to her lawyer.
- She traveled to Kazakhstan to collect her eight-year-old grandson.
- The boy is on Ukraine's list of children abducted by Russia.
- A Russian court had previously named Rozhanska as the alleged organizer of an abduction.
- Ukraine's Foreign Ministry asked Kazakh authorities not to grant Russia's extradition request.
Kazakh authorities detained Ukrainian citizen Liubov Rozhanska at Astana airport on October 1, following a request from Russian authorities, her lawyer, Alexei Pryanishnikov, told The Insider. Rozhanska had traveled to Kazakhstan to retrieve her eight-year-old grandson and return him to his father in Odesa, Ukraine, as part of an agreement with his Russian relatives.
Pryanishnikov stated that the boy is on Ukraine's list of children abducted by Russia, and a Ukrainian court had ruled he should be handed over to his father. Rozhanska arrived in Astana from Istanbul and was detained immediately. The Russian request was reportedly channeled through the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a security alliance led by Moscow.
The case originated as a family dispute in 2021 when Alla Andreeva, a Ukrainian citizen living in Odesa with her son, married Russian sailor Vitaly Andreev. According to Pryanishnikov, Andreev pressured her to move to Russia. In August 2021, Andreeva traveled with her son and husband to Kaliningrad, Russia, and never returned to Ukraine. The boy's father had agreed to the trip on the condition of his son's return.
Andreeva renounced her Ukrainian citizenship and that of her son in 2022, and both later obtained Russian citizenship. Court proceedings in Kaliningrad followed regarding the father's attempts to maintain contact. A court eventually permitted the father, a Ukrainian serviceman, to visit his son during summer holidays, but only within the Kaliningrad Region.
In 2023, an agreement was reached for the boy's return to Ukraine, but two Ukrainians sent to Kaliningrad were detained, accused of attempted abduction and espionage, and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. A Russian court also identified Rozhanska as the alleged organizer of this "abduction."
Pryanishnikov believes that negotiations for the child's return, which resumed in summer 2026, were controlled by the FSB. He cited the Russian family's insistence on Kazakhstan as the meeting location, repeated delays, and the simultaneous arrest order for Rozhanska by a Kaliningrad court at the FSB's request. "Everything suggests she was being lured there," Pryanishnikov said.
Ukraine's Foreign Ministry confirmed that its embassy in Kazakhstan had requested that authorities not immediately grant Russia's extradition request for Rozhanska. Consular officials also sought permission to visit Rozhanska, who is being held in a detention center, and received preliminary approval.