More Than 1.5 Million Refugees Have Fled Ukraine

The UN estimates the number could reach 4 million.

A girl wrapped in a blanket waits with others after fleeing Ukraine at the border crossing in Medyka, Poland on March 5.Markus Schreiber/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

More than 1.5 million refugees have fled Ukraine since the Russian invasion began 10 days ago, a UN official said Sunday. Filippo Grandi, the high commissioner for refugees, called it “the fastest growing refugee crisis in Europe since World War II.” Grandi has predicted that 4 million Ukrainians could be displaced from their home country by the fighting.

Most of the refugees have gone to Poland, while others have sought shelter in Hungary, Moldova, Slovakia, and Romania. “These are people that until just a few days ago, had a perfectly normal life,” Grandi told CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday, speaking from a refugee camp at the Ukrainian-Polish border. He said most of the evacuees were women, children, elderly people, and people with disabilities, as Ukrainian men of military age have been conscripted to stay and defend the country.

Grandi said countries outside Europe would need to provide more assistance to those who have fled. “One and a half million [people] is difficult enough to manage, even for relatively stable and prosperous countries in Europe,” he said. “But if this number of people grows, we will need more international support. And at some point, if people stay here for a long period of time, there will have to be other countries offering places to host refugees, even outside Europe.”

The commissioner for refugees added that he was not worried about possible political backlash against Ukrainian refugees, despite the fact that Poland and other European countries in recent years have tried to keep out people of color escaping from conflicts in other parts of the world. “Poland, just in the past year, has tried to build a wall to keep refugees out coming from the Middle East, from Africa,” Face the Nation moderator Margaret Brennan said.

“I think that this crisis, and I’ve said it before, carries an important message that anybody can become a refugee,” Grandi said. “Very suddenly. And that any country can become a front-line refugee receiving country needing the support of others.”

“Europe is learning fast to work together in so many ways in response to this crisis,” he added. “I hope that this working together will apply to all people seeking refuge in Europe, not only now which is happening, but in the future as well.”

Nevertheless, African and South Asian students who were studying in Ukraine say they have experienced racial discrimination while trying to flee Russia’s invasion. Ukrainian border guards have allegedly pushed them to the back of the line of refugees, allowing native Ukrainians to leave the country first.

As they wait, the violence mounts. On Sunday, a top Biden administration official said Russian troops have intentionally attacked civilians in Ukraine. “We’ve seen very credible reports of deliberate attacks on civilians, which would constitute a war crime,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on CNN’s State of the Union. “We’ve seen very credible reports about the use of certain weapons.”

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate