“More is to come; worse is to come,” said Ylva Johansson, the EU’s home-affairs commissioner, on March 8th. A week later, the number of people who have fled Ukraine has reached almost 3m. Some 2.3m have entered EU countries, almost as many as in 2015 and 2016 combined, during the height of the Syrian war.
The UNHCR, the UN’s refugee agency, had thought that up to 4m people—almost a tenth of Ukraine’s population—might flee. At current rates, that number will be hit by March 22nd. Conditions are worsening for citizens who remain. In Mariupol, a Ukrainian city under siege, Russian soldiers bombed a maternity hospital. The city is also running out of food and water.
Data from UNHCR show that Hungary, Romania and Slovakia have accepted 255,000, 85,000 and 205,000 refugees, respectively. Another 105,000 have arrived in Moldova, one of Europe’s poorest countries—equivalent to about 4% of its population.
Many migrants are trying to join relatives farther afield. About 300,000 have reached European countries beyond Ukraine’s immediate neighbours. Some 130,000 people have left for Russia and 1,000 have crossed into Belarus. Another 2m are thought to be displaced in Ukraine. Attempts to establish humanitarian corridors have been ill-fated. Russian officials offered a temporary ceasefire for civilians to flee—but only if they headed to Russia or Belarus.
The EU now estimates that up to 7m people may seek refuge abroad. That would represent about a quarter of the population eligible to leave (Ukrainian men aged between 18 and 60 have to stay in the country to fight). With war raging, no one knows how many will return, or when. The exodus from Ukraine has been sudden. Its effects, both on those fleeing and on the country they leave behind, will endure for years.
Editor’s note (March 14th 2022): This article has been updated with the latest numbers from the UNHCR.
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