Only minutes to pack: thousands of evacuees flee to safety from the worst war-affected areas in Ukraine

Evacuation in Donetsk region: mandatory for families with children  

“You have to leave. Now.”  

With these words, special evacuation teams led by the emergency services arrive every day to small villages and towns along the frontline in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. With the Russian Armed Forces advancing towards the city of Pokrovsk and fighting intensifying, the authorities have issued a mandatory evacuation order, especially for families with children.  

Oleksandr and Valeria have been living in Myrnohrad — a town where the sound of shelling has become a daily reality. With their three young sons, Sasha, Artem, and Matvii, they had no other choice than to flee into the unknown, taking only what they could carry.  

“We had only forty minutes to pack our stuff. A bus arrived and we were told to get ready and to take only necessary things. I left without any documents, as they were in an apartment damaged by shelling. We were crying as we left. We did not even have time to say goodbye to my parents, who stayed behind. They decided to remain in Myrnohrad until the very end,” Oleksandr recalls. 

The family was first taken to one of the transit centres for evacuees that have been established by the authorities in the neighboring Dnipropetrovsk region. Along with other humanitarian actors, UNHCR and its NGO partners support evacuees arriving to the facility by providing blankets, matrasses and pillows to create additional sleeping places. In the transit centre, displaced people can spend several days before moving to longer-term accommodation solution in Dnipropetrovsk region or further to central or western regions of Ukraine.  

UNHCR’s local NGO partner Right to Protection provided the family with legal advice about renewal of their documents. They also received psychosocial assistance, helping them to overcome the stress and traumatic experience of evacuation.  

Fleeing intensified shelling in Sumy region  

Maryna, a mother of two and pregnant with her third child, also took the hard decision to leave her home in Bilopillia, a town in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region, located just seven kilometers from the Russian border. The town is under constant threat, enduring daily attacks by heavy artillery and glide bombs. UNHCR’s local NGO partner Proliska helped Maryna and her children evacuate to a transit centre in the city of Sumy, where she received psychosocial support and got enrolled for cash assistance. Later on, Maryna was transferred to a collective centre that accommodates internally displaced people with nowhere else to go.  

Maryna’s mother, brother and husband stayed behind to look after their farm animals. The separation from her family is the hardest for Maryna:  

“I did not want to evacuate at all, and right now I really miss my own house. But it is very scary to return due to constant shelling. Even Sumy city is not safe. I will try to go for a month with my children to the west of Ukraine, and then we will see if it is possible to return home.” 

New home in western Ukraine  

Leaving their communities, either on their own or with the support from authorities and volunteers, evacuees are offered to go by evacuation trains to Rivne and Lviv regions in western Ukraine.  

One of them, 39-year-old Olha, took this opportunity to flee their heavily shelled village in Donetsk region, together with her 12-year-old daughter. They arrived by train to Rivne at the beginning of August and found shelter in a temporary accommodation centre hosting many displaced people. Back home, she worked in a mine but is now struggling to find a job to support her family, as they try to settle in their new community.  

“I have worked all my life, and in these new circumstances, my first thought was that I needed to find a job and secure housing to regain a sense of stability. So, I immediately registered with the State Employment Service  to find a job. I will use cash assistance provided by UNHCR to buy the essentials, like a kettle and a bed. We live in a small room that we share with other displaced like us, and I want to provide my daughter with as much comfort as possible,“ said Olha.  

To help her address the most critical needs after the evacuation, UNHCR has provided Olha with cash assistance and legal aid.   

The Ukrainian authorities assess that about 83,000 people have been forced to leave their homes in the Donetsk region since 1 August due to worsened security situation and intensified hostilities. Some of them have used evacuation options provided by authorities, volunteers and NGOs, others have left on their own. Also, about 22,000 residents have been evacuated from frontline areas in the Sumy region since 1 August. UNHCR and its NGO partners provide assistance to evacuees in the transit centres set up by the authorities and in their new hosting communities. This is possible thanks to the generous support from donors, including the top five donors to UNHCR’s Ukraine operation: the United States of America, the European Union, France, Norway and Japan. 

 

Chadi Ouanes, Oleksii Barkov and Marta Kocherha contributed to this story.  

Share on Facebook Share on Twitter