Ukraine refugee crisis nears 3 million as Russia war continues: UN

The UN says those fleeing early in the conflict mostly had resources and contacts outside Ukraine, but now many of the refugees had left in a hurry and were more vulnerable.

Nearly three weeks into the war, the number of Ukrainians fleeing abroad approached three million on Tuesday, the United Nations said, as people escaped fighting and Russian bombardment.

About 2.95 million people have so far left Ukraine, data from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) showed. It is basing its aid plans on four million refugees but has said the figure will likely increase.

After Sunday’s Russian strike on the Yavoriv military base near Lviv, some people from western Ukraine have now joined the refugee flow across the border.

“Everybody considered West Ukraine to be quite safe, until they started striking Lviv,” said Zhanna, 40, a mother from Kharkiv, who was heading to Poland to reunite with her godmother who left Ukraine a few days earlier.

“We left Kharkiv for Kirovohrad,” she said at the train station of Przemysl, the nearest town to Poland’s busiest border crossing with Ukraine. “We wanted to stay there. We did not want to go abroad.”

“Then they started striking Kirovohrad, they started striking Lviv and it is complicated to avoid bombs with a small child,” she said, adding that her husband had stayed in Ukraine.

In Romania, Ukrainian women and children, some clutching teddy bears, continued to stream through the Siret border crossing where temperatures dropped to -2 degrees Celsius overnight.

Pulling suitcases and carrying backpacks, they were met by Romanian firefighters and volunteers, who carried their belongings to buses transporting them onwards.