Ukrainian Refugees Are Heading Home in Droves
Many are returning after Russian pullback from parts of the country: ‘We had the feeling that we were in the wrong place.’
Hanna Kopylova traveled through the Krakow International Airport in Poland from Bergamo, Italy, on her way to return to Kyiv.
By Natalia Ojewska and Ian LovettFollow
/Photographs by Sasha Maslov for The Wall Street Journal
May 16, 2022 6:06 am ET
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PRZEMYSL, Poland—When Russia invaded Ukraine nearly three months ago, Hanna Kopylova fled Kyiv with her two children for northern Italy.
The family was safe in Bergamo, where her parents have owned a home for years. But on a recent weekend, Ms. Kopylova kissed her children goodbye and headed back into Ukraine on her own.
“I am afraid,” said Ms. Kopylova, 34 years old, but added, “When you see all this bravery on the news, you want to be part of it.”
Ukrainian refugees are heading home in droves, following the Russian pullback from the central part of the country.
People lined up to board a train to Kyiv at the station in Przemyśl, Poland, this month.
More people have returned to Ukraine than left the country in recent days, the country’s border service said on Sunday. On Saturday, 37,000 people left Ukraine via crossings to the European Union and Moldova, and 46,000 entered the country. Crossings in and out of Poland—where the majority of those who fled Ukraine have gone—have been roughly even since mid-April.
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Overall, millions of Ukrainians remain in exile across Europe: Almost six million have left the country since the war began, according to United Nations statistics, while roughly 1.5 million people have entered the country over the same period.
Since the Russian pullback, many areas that Ukrainians fled in February and March are now relatively safe, including Kyiv.
“Refugees almost always want to go home,“ said Gillian Triggs, assistant high commissioner for protection with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. ”If there has been a withdrawal of Russian forces and they want to go back to their villages, they will do it, even though they know the shells are still falling and there is danger.”
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Though occasional shells continue to hit the capital and its surroundings, more refugees each day are deciding that it is now time to head home. Some want to see their husbands (who, in most cases, weren’t allowed to leave the country), or take care of elderly parents. Others, like Ms. Kopylova, say they feel a need to help their country however they can.
Even after her ex-husband told her she couldn’t bring the children back with her, Ms. Kopylova said, she remained determined to go. Her partner is in the territorial defense, and she said she hopes to volunteer bringing food and other goods to recently liberated areas: “I have a car, hands and legs. I can help, too.”
Throughout the war, Ukrainians have been heading back home for a variety of reasons. In the early weeks, thousands of young men who had been living abroad returned home to fight. Some people found work ferrying humanitarian or military aid into the country. Older Ukrainians often helped get their loved ones out but then returned home themselves, preferring the risks of war to the prospect of restarting life in a foreign country.
Liubor Piatetska got ready to bring her daughters to Kyiv from the Przemyśl train station in Przemyśl, Poland.
Karina Tomchuk, left, and Alina Kabanets waited for a train in Przemyśl on their way back home to the Kyiv region.
Though there are no statistics on exactly who is crossing the border, the demographics of those heading back to Ukraine appear to have shifted. In the Polish border town of Przemyśl, hundreds of women lined up for trains back to Ukraine on a recent weekend.
Like several others lined up on a recent Sunday, Liubor Piatetska, a 26-year-old mother of two, was bringing her children back into Ukraine with her. During the two months since she fled Kyiv to stay with friends in Sweden, she had hardly been able to speak to her husband. A Ukrainian soldier who has been fighting in Kharkiv, he seldom has an internet connection. He sometimes manages to call his mother, who is also in Ukraine, and she gives Ms. Piatetska updates. Her parents and siblings also remained in Ukraine.
“Everyone in Sweden was telling me, ‘Stay, please stay,’” she said. “It’s love that brings me home. The love for Ukraine and of my husband. Even though we had very comfortable living conditions in Sweden, we had the feeling that we were in the wrong place.”
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Alona Gorkavchuk took a bus home to Ukraine with daughter Liza after two months spent in Warsaw.
Ms. Piatetska said she hopes to return to her job in an electronics shop. The city’s subway has reopened, albeit at a vastly reduced schedule. A ban on the sale of alcohol imposed in the first days of the war has been lifted. And businesses that were closed for months are starting to open their doors again—adding to the allure of home for those who have spent the last few months abroad.
“I have a coffeehouse on my street that has prepared food for soldiers for two months, and now half the day they prepare coffee again,” said Daryna Antoniuk, a 21-year-old student and journalist who spent the first months of the war in Latvia and has gone back to Ukraine “They kept me so motivated.”
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Returnees are aware of the dangers. A Russian missile hit a 21-story apartment building over two weeks ago when the United Nations secretary-general was visiting the city. But as the war has dragged into its third month, getting to go home, they say, means accepting some level of risk. Many acknowledged they might end up having to flee again.
Marina Volynets has already fled conflict with Russia twice. A native of Donetsk, she first left to stay with her sister in Amsterdam in 2014, when Russian-backed forces invaded that region. Unable to find a job, she moved back to Ukraine and settled in Kyiv the following year, where she lived until February. Then, she left for Amsterdam a second time, before continuing to Portugal.
Ms. Volynets has now returned to Kyiv. Her husband is unable to leave the country and is working as a cook for the Ukrainian army. Her parents also stayed in Ukraine.
“I find it more difficult to stay away and just wait” for the war to end without any idea when that will be, she said. “Yes, it will be more difficult and more scary and more dangerous” at home, she said, “but at least it will be our life as a family.”
