1 million children leave behind lives, friends in Ukraine
UNICEF calls exodus fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since WWII
ZAHONY, HUNGARY After bombs started falling in her hometown of Kharkiv, Annamaria Maslovska left her friends, her toys and her life in Ukraine and set off on a days-long journey with her mother toward safety in the West.
After finally crossing the Hungarian border by train along with hundreds of other Ukrainian refugees, the 10-year-old said she was worried about her friends in Kharkiv after the messages she sent to them on Viber went unanswered.
“I really miss them because I can’t contact them, they just read my messages and that’s all. I really worry, because I don’t know where they are,” she said, speaking clear English from inside the train station at the border town of Zahony.
Annamaria, who was raised alone by her mother, is one of more than 1 million children who have fled Ukraine in the less than two weeks since Russia first invaded the country, something UNICEF spokesperson James Elder called “a dark historical first.”
That means that children represent at least half of the more than 2 million people who have fled the war, an exodus the UN refugee agency has called the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since the Second World War. There have even been cases of children having to make the journey alone.
While very young children may not grasp that their lives have been upended, older ones are aware of their hardship and risk suffering the psychological trauma of war and seeking refuge, experts say.
For Margot, a one-year-old girl who traveled from Kyiv to the Siret border crossing in Romania, the journey was like a “little adventure,” said her mother, Viktoria Filonchuk, 37.
But for older children, she suspects they understand the “tragedy” of what they are going through.
“Such little kids maybe don’t understand this, but kids of about three or four years understand all the tragedy. I think it is very hard for them,” Filonchuk said.
Daniel Gradinaru, a coordinator of Fight for Freedom, a Christian NGO at the Romanian border, said that older children could be “marked for the rest of their lives” by the experience of unexpectedly leaving their homes and traveling for days in the cold.
“I hope that where they are going, the people receiving them give them counseling,” Gradinaru said.
Most of those fleeing the war have entered countries on Ukraine’s western border, like Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Romania and Moldova. The majority have gone into Poland, where 1.33 million refugees have crossed according to the Polish Border Guard agency.
Many Ukrainians in recent days have attempted to flee their cities through humanitarian corridors opened up to give them safe passage out of conflict areas.
But Natalia Mudrenko, the highest-ranking woman at Ukraine’s UN Mission, has accused Russia of holding civilians, including women and children, “hostage” in some of Ukraine’s embattled cities and assaulting them as they attempt to flee. Speaking at a UN Security Council meeting Tuesday afternoon, Mudrenko said that civilians “are not allowed to leave and the humanitarian aid is not let in.”
“If they try to leave, Russians open fire and kill them,” Mudrenko said. “They are running out of food and water, and they die.”
I really worry, because I don’t know where they are. ANNAMARIA MASLOVSKA UKRAINIAN REFUGEE ON HER FRIENDS