President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that he had addressed Chinese President Xi Jinping during their phone conversation with a call to assist in the return of Ukrainian children deported to Russia.

"We spoke [with Xi Jinping] about the return of our people, prisoners and the return of our deported children. There are about 20,000 of them. These are the moments when we must involve everyone we can, different countries of the world, so that they put pressure on aggressor and terrorist – Russia, which stole so many of our children," Zelenskyy said during a press conference with the presidents of the Czech Republic and Slovakia in Kyiv.

However, he said, the process of returning minors to Ukraine from Russia is very complicated.

"I'll be frank that only Ukraine is helping Ukraine in the issue of returning children. There are no bad messages here. It's just really difficult to do. The UN is trying, many people want to do something, but so far the results are weak. Therefore, with this appeal, I also addressed the leader of China," Zelenskyy said.