Estimates of how many Ukrainians have ended up in Russia since the invasion vary. Russia claims more than 2.4 million have been admitted as part of a humanitarian mission, while Ukrainian officials say 1.2 million of its citizens have been forcibly deported to Russia or Russian-held territories such as Crimea since late February. In July, the US State Department concluded that between 900,000 and 1.6 million Ukrainian citizens have been forcibly deported to Russia. According to researchers with Human Rights Watchthere have been reports of refugees being threatened, aggressively searched and held against their will in several detention centers known as “filtering camps”. “We went through hostile territory,” said Dariya, who is from the Kherson region and had to travel through Russian-annexed Crimea to finally reach Estonia. “We spoke Russian on purpose so as not to draw attention to ourselves, because we don’t know what the situation is like.” In many cases, after passing through checkpoints, Ukrainians were put on buses and trains and transported to 55 regions across Russia. Many chose to board the vehicles and head west because they had little choice when it came to leaving Eastern Ukraine. Here are some of their journeys.
“By a miracle we survived”
Igor, 49, is a retired worker from the Azovstal iron and steel plant: the same fortress-like factory in Mariupol that gained international attention this spring as Ukrainian units, including the Azov Regiment, defended it for three months before delivered in May. Igor tried to escape Mariupol with his family on March 17, but it took months for them to reach the EU. As the city came under siege for the first time in late February, Igor, who asked to be identified only by the small his name for his safety, he said he was sheltering in the basement of his apartment building with his wife and two children. The building was heavily attacked. He said he knows at least two of his neighbors who died. Video from his home was posted online and shows his building partially collapsed and completely blackened by the blasts. “It’s a miracle we survived,” he said. “Then for another week we hid in the basement of the house next door.” Igor’s family currently lives on a cruise ship that was previously used for passengers traveling from Riga, Latvia to Stockholm, Sweden. It now temporarily houses more than 1,800 Ukrainian refugees in Tallinn, Estonia. (Briar Stewart/CBC) At that point they decided they had to leave, he said, and since there were no safe corridors to the east, they were forced to go toward Russia. But as they left town, Igor and his family stopped at a Russian checkpoint. When soldiers discovered a tattoo of a Ukrainian trident under a ring on his left hand, he said he was detained and his family refused to leave Mariupol without him. The trident is a symbol of Ukraine and is associated with the country’s military. He said he got the tattoo while serving in 1991. According to Ukrainian refugees and video released by Russia’s own state media, Russian soldiers often check for tattoos as they look for military connections and any symbols the government says are associated with ” Nazism”.
From flight, to detention
Igor did not want to give more details about what exactly happened while he was detained, but he was interrogated. He said he was taken to various detention centers before being sent to a military barracks in Russian-held Donetsk, where he slept on the floor on a wooden pallet. He said government employees and volunteers of Ukraine’s territorial defense unit are being held with him.
“There was no way I could contact my family,” he said. “I couldn’t get in touch and they didn’t even know where I was.”
Igor spoke to CBC News on August 31 in Tallinn, Estonia, where he now lives on a cruise ship with 1,800 other Ukrainian refugees. At one point during the interview, he removed his ring to reveal a mutilated piece of skin underneath.
Igor, 49, shows his burn mark and the remains of a tattoo he tried to burn while in a detention center in Eastern Ukraine. He got the Ukrainian trident tattoo while in the military in 1991. (Janis Laizans/CBC)
While in custody, he grabbed a piece of coal from a stove used for heating, he said, and pressed it against his skin. He was trying to burn his tattoo so other Russian soldiers wouldn’t see it.
The blue outline of the trident is still partially visible.
Igor was released after 30 days, but said Russian soldiers kept his passport. All that was returned to him was a photocopy with a stamp from the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic”. The self-proclaimed separatist government, backed by Russian forces, has ruled an occupied region of eastern Ukraine since 2013 but remains unrecognized by most of the world.
Once Igor returned to Mariupol, he boarded a bus with his family to Taganrog, Russia, and when they arrived, his daughter connected with volunteer groups on social media who offered to help.
Igor, who lives temporarily on a ship in Tallinn, was detained for 30 days when he first tried to leave Mariupol. (Corinne Seminoff/CBC)
A non-profit organization called Helping to Leave helped them with accommodation and transport, but when his family tried to cross the Russian border into Estonia in May, he said border guards wouldn’t let him out because he didn’t have his passport.
He and his family tried another route. They headed south and were able to escape through Belarus, before eventually crossing into Latvia and then Estonia.
“I breathed a sigh of relief,” he said. “I didn’t think I was going to get out of there.”
The four of them are currently sleeping in bunks in a room on the cruise ship in Tallinn. They would like to settle in Estonia, he said, and his children are enrolled in school while he looks for work.
“There are some who hate us”
Human Rights Watch researchers say there are no public figures on how many Ukrainian refugees have remained in Russia, but Natalya and her daughter, 17, are among a group who have decided to stay, at least for now. Natalya, who also asked to be identified only by her first name for her safety, spoke to CBC News from Ryazan, Russia, located about 200 kilometers southeast of Moscow. He also left Mariupol after spending three weeks in a bomb shelter along with several other families. Natalya left Mariupol and currently lives in Ryazan, Russia. She said it was difficult at first as she didn’t know her rights while living in the country, but gradually it got easier. He hopes to be able to return to Mariupol once it is rebuilt. (Submitted) On March 23, after the building next door was hit, she said she and others started running. “People were in a panic,” he said. “People were even walking over dead bodies.” He said he then met a group of Chechen soldiers who gave them some bread and showed them which way to go. They went down to the coast and began to head west along the Sea of Azov. She said that when she turned to look behind her, all she could see was her city on fire. He estimates they walked for 15 kilometers before a bus picked them up. WATCHES | Why some Ukrainians choose to return to their homeland:
On a refugee train of Ukrainians heading home
Despite the dangers, some Ukrainian refugees are returning to the war-torn country — each for their own reasons. They board trains heading east to war-torn regions, hoping to claim what’s left of their country. When they finally crossed the border into Russia, he said he felt a sense of relief. At a reception centre, they were given tea and sandwiches, but he said some Russians were openly hostile. “There are some people who hate us. They don’t hide it.” Natalya decided to stay in Russia because she is not clear what to do next, she said. She has no permanent place to live and divides her time between relatives and hostels. “Everybody wakes up thinking about going home,” he said. “We want to return to a peaceful life.”
Choosing to enter Russia now
While the majority of Ukrainian refugees entered Russia in the first weeks after the invasion, others are now leaving after living through the war for months. On August 30, CBC News visited a temporary hostel in Narva, Estonia, which was being used to house Ukrainian refugees. Dariya, 28, and Viktoria, 43, who also asked not to be named for their safety, arrived recently and were staying there with their husbands and children. The families, from the Kherson region, spent months living through explosions before deciding they had to leave. There are fears that fighting in the region could increase dramatically as Ukraine has signaled the start of an offensive to retake occupied territory. Dariya, left, and Viktoria, right, spoke to the CBC in late August in Estonia after traveling out of Ukraine via Crimea. (Briar Stewart/CBC News) To leave the country, the two families headed south through Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014. As they passed through checkpoints, Viktoria says they were careful to speak Russian, not Ukrainian. Before they started, everyone in the group deleted photos and some contacts from their phones because they expected to be searched, they said. Their two husbands were taken away, checked for tattoos and questioned. While there is a ban on most men aged 18 to 60 from leaving…
