Missing 9-year-old Ukrainian girl found murdered in Germany

Lina Portman4 weeks ago

0 1 minute read

A 9-year-old Ukrainian refugee who disappeared while walking to school in Germany earlier this month has been found dead, local police said Wednesday.

“We are certain that the deceased is Valeriia, 9 years old, missing… Valeriia was the victim of a crime. We are investigating a murder,” Saxony Police President Carsten Kaempf said at a press conference on Wednesday.

His body was reportedly found in a wooded area not far from his home in the town of Döbeln, Saxony, hidden under brush. Frantic search efforts involving hundreds of police officers were launched to find the girl after she never showed up to school on June 3, the last time she was seen that morning then that she was going to class.

Police said Valeriia's body showed signs of violence, but Attorney General Ingrid Burghart said there was no evidence she had been sexually assaulted.

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A witness told police two days after the girl's disappearance that she “heard screams” coming from the forest where Valeriia was later found. Investigators would therefore examine this area as the crime scene.

Valeriia, whose last name was not released by police, had moved to Germany with her mother after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but her father reportedly stayed home to serve in the Ukrainian army.