African and Indian students reported discrimination and multiple difficulties while trying to flee Ukraine.
The BBC was made aware of versions of black foreigners who say trains are denied entry and held up at borders, and ukrainians are allowed through first.
Although they acknowledge that the wait to leave Ukraine is long, the border authorities deny that there is discrimination.
The Polish border force told the BBC that all those fleeing the conflict in Ukraine are welcome in Poland, regardless of their nationality.
Tens of thousands of international students travel to Ukraine each year, often to study medicine or engineering.
Now some are struggling to cross the border to try to get back to their country, while others are stuck in cities as Russian forces attack.
Asya is a medical student of Somali origin studying in Kiev. Two days ago, she posted a video on Twitter as airstrikes hit the city.
She fled with friends soon after, but was unprepared for the long journey to Poland and spent three days without eating or sleeping before reaching the Medyka border crossing on Sunday.
For six hours, he said, no Africans were allowed to passalthough he saw buses with Ukrainian women and children pass by.
“Finally we managed to cross and they told us that the hotel accommodation was only for Ukrainians,” he said. She had to go on to Warsaw to find a place to stay.
Ukrainians also face lengthy delays leaving the country, with 40-kilometre queues for cars and buses at some border points.
But, according to several international students who spoke to the BBC, the situation is particularly serious for black people.
Jessica, a Nigerian student, says that she had to walk for hours to the border with Poland and when she got there with the intention of taking a bus, the Ukrainian guards told her that the priority was Ukrainian citizens.
“I was pleading with him. The official looked me in the eye and said ‘Ukrainians only. That’s it’. They told me that being black I should walk, ”he told the BBC.
“I even lied and told them I was pregnant and they didn’t care.”
The BBC tried to contact the Ukrainian border force, but did not receive an immediate response.
Some displaced journalists on the ground qualify these complaints and explain that the problem is that there are two lines: one for Ukrainian passports and another for the rest. And they both move very slowly.
“People are nervous, it is logical and they are afraid of being blocked. But it is dangerous to say that they do not let black people through because there are still many inside Ukraine and if that information reaches them they will not know whether to go to the border,” journalist Hibai Arbide from Lviv warns on his Twitter account.
Return to your native country
Ruqqaya, a medical student from Nigeria, was at the university in Kharkiv, in the east of the country, when the city was attacked.
He was unable to get transport to the western border and had to walk 11 hours overnight before reaching the Medyka crossing on Saturday morning.
“When I came here there were black people sleeping on the streets,” he told the BBC. He claims that the armed guards told him to wait, as the Ukrainians had to be let through first.
He watched buses full of people, whom he described as white, who were allowed to cross the border, while only a handful of Africans were selected from the queue.
He was allowed to pass at around 02:00am on Sunday and headed to Warsaw to fly back to Nigeria.
The UN reported that some 368,000 refugees left Ukrainea country with 44 million inhabitants, since the Russian invasion began on Thursday, February 24.
cross to romania
Polla Vishnu Vardhan Rao is a medical student at Pirogov National University in Vinnytsia, central Ukraine.
He and a group of other Indian students made the 12-hour drive to Ukraine’s border crossing with Romania.
At the border, he said, only Ukrainian citizens, who were queuing in a separate line, were allowed to cross.
There were a series of aggressive exchanges with Ukrainian border guards as the Indian students grew increasingly frustrated with the wait.
The Indian government says control centers are being set up to help its citizens to cross the border points with Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.
“Mistreated at the border”
Nigeria and South Africa say they have sent officials to border areas to help their citizens cross as well.
A senior official from South Africa’s international relations office, Clayson Monyela, said on Twitter that “South African and other African students were mistreated at the Ukrainian-Polish border”.
Isaac, who is also a Nigerian, arrived at the Medyka border at 4:30 a.m. on Saturday. On Sunday afternoon, border staff told him they were not “serving Africans.”
“We have been chased, we have been beaten by policemen armed with sticks when we tried to press and push forward. There was also a confrontation between the soldiers and the boys who are here waiting,” he recounted.
Many of the students the BBC spoke to had low phone battery and it was unclear whether Isaac passed successfully. His phone was off.
Difficulty getting on a train
The BBC also received reports of discrimination against foreigners at train stations.
Osemen is Nigerian and tried to board a train in Lviv that would take him to the Polish border. He claimed that he had been told that only Ukrainians would be allowed on board.
Other students recounted similar experiences, such as a young Nigerian woman in the city of Dnipro, in eastern Ukraine. she was trying get on a trainbut also trying to get private transportation with a group of other foreigners.
Some students are stuck in Ukrainian cities and have not yet faced the challenge of escaping from a country they barely know and whose language they do not speak.
At least 15,000 Indian students were reported stranded in Ukraine, including 4,000 in Kharkiv, which is under heavy shelling.
A young woman sent the BBC a video of her sheltering in a basement with hundreds of other students.
They are wrapped in blankets and huddled on the floor. She says they are running out of food and have begged the Indian government to help them evacuate.
Elsewhere in Kharkiv, medical student Siddharth took refuge with his friends in a nearby metro station. Many of them delayed his departure, he said, because they had upcoming exams they wanted to complete.
Source: Eluniverso
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