The UN already estimates more than 600,000 refugees from the Ukraine war

The UN already estimates that more than 660,000 people, mostly women and children, have fled from Ukraine to neighboring countries since Russia began the war. Shabia Mantoo, spokesperson for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told a briefing in Geneva that there were reports of people they waited up to 60 hours to enter Polandwhile queues at the Romanian border were up to 20 km long.

The exodus of people fleeing the humanitarian catastrophe is also complicated by low temperatures and transportation problems that force them to walk long distances. Mark Goncharuk he is one of the minor Ukrainians who has had to travel this path. As he told a Reuters team that managed to rescue him, his father had stayed in Kiev to defend the nation: “We had been walking for about three hours and you saved us. I thought we would have to walk for two or three days, that we would have to walk all the day, but you helped us“.

Poland, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Moldova, all of them neighbors of Ukraine, are for now the main destinations of this flow of refugees.

For its part, the International Organization for Migrants (IOM) of the United Nations welcomed in a statement the decision of different governments to support the Ukrainian diaspora through visa extensions.

In this regard, he welcomed the fact that the EU is discussing guaranteeing Ukrainian refugees temporary protection statuswhich would allow them to live and work for up to three years in one of the 27 Member States.

IOM is also trying to assist An estimated 470,000 foreigners live in Ukraine, many of them currently trapped in the country due to the conflict, including students and migrant workers. Some countries in Africa, the Middle East and Asia have asked IOM for help to care for these migrants, as well as the estimated 6,000 who have managed to reach neighboring Moldova and Slovakia.