Irina is optimistic and full of life. Even though her life at 28 has been devastated and turned upside down over the past nine months, like millions of other Ukrainian refugees, she is trying to be resilient. « I have been living in Spain since March 2022. I fled with my mother and my teenage niece when it was possible to walk through Kyiv, so we fled, although the bombing continued. We first arrived in Poland, where we heard about a voluntary organization offering Ukrainians to move to Spain. And we got on the bus without knowing where we were going or for how long, because the shelters in Poland were already full,” he told Global Voices in a telephone interview.
Now, Irina lives in an apartment set up by volunteers, but she’ll only have it until the new year. Although Spain had determined it would give monetary aid to Ukrainians fleeing the war, so far no payments have been made, although it has provided room and board to those whose accommodations were arranged by the Red Cross.
“I had a successful small business in Ukraine, selling sportswear and yoga through an online store and Instagram…everything was made in Ukraine by seven local manufacturers…now only two are left. Apparently, the store is barely functioning,” said Irina.
Irina’s boyfriend and brother joined the Ukrainian army. Irina’s mother and her niece Natsya returned to Kyiv in July. The teenager couldn’t cope with losing all her friends from Ukraine and going to a school where she didn’t speak any of the languages she used (Catalan schools teach Catalan and some Spanish). Irina’s mother’s husband became seriously ill (men of military service age cannot leave Ukraine), so she also returned. This happened after Russia again bombarded Kyiv.
Irina said, “There they are without light and sometimes without water… But Natsya is very happy.” “He doesn’t want to leave Kyiv again.” Irina, on the other hand, lives in Poland and is taking intensive courses in Spanish and 3D design, and hopes to find a job in Spain. “I worked in a bar for a while, but I realized that instead of spending my life working in a bar, I should learn Spanish and become a professional,” she said.
Irina is not the only case who wants to live out her life in the country that granted her temporary protection. According to UNHCR, other EU countries have accepted 4.7 million refugees from Ukraine.
There is no precedent in the legal history of the European Union.
In an unexpected turn of events, the European Union opted for a temporary safeguards directive that requires EU member states to accept higher flows of refugees. The directive was created during the war in Yugoslavia (2001), but was not implemented again until March 2022, shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Stefan Phillips, a researcher at the Human Rights Institute at Åbo Academy University, explained in a telephone interview with Global Voices that:
Lena is another refugee from Ukraine who was able to get a job in Finland after waiting five months for her documents to be ready. “Ukrainians are very hardworking, thrifty and persistent people. During the eight months of the war, those who did settled down little by little and found a way to earn money,” he said.
Lena is studying Finnish and hopes to live in the European Union. In a telephone interview with Global Voices, he explains:
But will Ukrainian refugees be able to stay in the EU after the directive expires? Stephen says:
The uncertainty of this situation is high and it is not yet known how EU states will approach changes to the status of people under temporary protection once the directive and the conflict have ended. Nevertheless, it is something the EU should start to consider.
Lena says there are other categories for Ukrainian refugees that the EU has to consider:
The cost of the war in Russia is high for Ukraine: the unemployment rate is nearing 35% and the poverty rate could reach 25% in December this year and 50% by the end of next year. Clearly, most of the 4.7 million Ukrainian refugees want to return home when the war ends and the EU needs to consider what happens to those who do not want to return.
Artículo de Daria Dergacheva, traducido por Antonia Díaz para Global Voices.
