Saved from hell... thanks to the Express
A FAMILY of three who completed a two-month journey to the UK from Ukraine last night thanked the Daily Express for helping them to escape.
They also gave heartfelt gratitude to the people of Britain and Prime Minister Boris Johnson for doing so much to help their country in its hour of need.
Missiles
Roman Bezsonov, 34, his wife Iryna, 33, and their two-year-old son Erik made it as far as Turkey before they ran out of money.
This newspaper stepped in to provide the flights they needed to complete their journey.
The family, who worry for family left behind, had been granted refugee visas five weeks after applying thanks to the efforts of British lawyer Helen Peach, who had agreed to sponsor them at her home in Chatham, Kent.
Roman told how within days of leaving their own apartment in Kyiv, missiles were exploding close to the building.
He said: “We heard Putin’s speech a few days before he invaded. It was crazy. I realised he was going to try to take all of our country, that nowhere would be safe. Iryna and I talked about nothing else and we decided we had to leave right now.”
The couple packed immediately and left Kyiv at 11pm on February 23 in their Skoda Octavia car, driving to the nearest safe border town of Siret where they could cross into Romania.As they drove through the night they saw Russian rockets striking the airport at IvanoFrankivsk in Western Ukraine, and realised the war had begun.
Roman, who trained as a lawyer before starting his own business, said: “Our apartment was only a few hundred metres from the Antonov aircraft factory in Kyiv, which was hit by missiles a few days after we left.
“How can you protect a twoyear-old boy from such things? You cannot.”
It took the family five days to drive through Romania, cross