Women’s Exodus: RICHARD PENDLBURY sees fleeing mothers and children on the Polish border, torn apart by fathers forced to fight in Ukraine … as thousands of families head west to seek safety from Putin’s planes and tanks
- Mothers and children gathered at the Korcova border crossing with Poland on Friday
- Poland fears there may be an influx of more than one million civilians from Ukraine
- Reception stations are being built at key points on the 300-mile border
- Thousands are heading west to seek safety from Putin’s planes and tanks
One can describe it as “women’s escape.”
Of course, refugees come from all walks of life and social backgrounds.
Both the rich and the poor escaped the catastrophe that engulfed their nation, transported by all means of transportation, from brand new ports to battered hatchbacks.
But one detail was striking and uniform: no man of military age could be seen among them.
This was the eviction of mothers and children of Ukraine at the gloomy border crossing Korchova with Poland yesterday afternoon.
Poland fears an influx of more than a million civilians from neighboring Ukraine amid the Russian invasion. In the photo: People on the Ukrainian side of the Polish border near Moshiska
They were at the forefront of what Poland fears could be an influx of more than a million civilians from neighboring Ukraine, driven from their homes by the Russian invasion.
The two countries share a border of more than 300 miles and are receiving reception points at key checkpoints aliens and provide them with food and water.
Thousands of families are heading west to seek safety from Putin’s planes and tanks.
Many we met there endured more than 24 hours of waiting on the Ukrainian side, only to suffer the new heart that their husbands, fathers, sons and brothers were prevented from crossing into Poland with them.
Ukrainian authorities have ruled that men between the ages of 18 and 60 cannot leave. They are expected to remain and fight as part of a general military mobilization.
And so families fell apart safely. 31-year-old Irya drove to the Polish border with her husband Oleg and their 11-year-old daughter from the city of Ternopil.
Ukrainian women and children seen at Slovak-Ukrainian border crossing Vishne Nemek after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
“Then, after 25 hours of waiting to cross, I had to say goodbye to Oleg,” she said.
“The situation is terrible. I don’t know what to do now. I’m alone.’
Two families from Kiev also saw their husbands taken to the border after waiting 20 hours to cross.
They had not met before their ordeal and planned to travel to Italy and the Czech Republic, respectively, where they had a relationship.
But they had joined together after their husbands were forced to leave and traveled in the same car to cross the border – a solidarity between strangers born of mutual suffering.
Among them was eight-year-old schoolgirl Boy, who was carrying her pet white mouse, Pshuk, in a plastic travel box.
The mouse was missed, her father was not.
Some of the female drivers had a special reason to feel devastated.
Thousands of families are heading west to seek safety from Putin’s planes. Pictured: Civilians arrive in the Medica region of Poland, on the border with Ukraine, on February 25
22-year-old Gena was born in the Russian city of Rostov and married a Ukrainian woman. He was also banned from crossing.
She reached the Polish side with the steering wheel of her Toyota, with her two children and, according to her, plans to drive to the capital Warsaw, although she does not know anyone there.
She was pale and fascinated, worried about what and whom she had left behind. “I have many friends and relatives in Russia,” she told the Daily Mail.
“Now I have to flee because of this country – Russia – which I have always considered a friend.”
In the evening we reached Ukraine at the pedestrian crossing near Moshtiska.
It was an unusual scene. Thousands of women and children waited in the cold on foot when it got dark to flee the Russians – and cross into Poland.
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