Russians: 'You Will See Our Faces ... Not Our Backs'

"You have been told that this flame will bring liberation to Ukraine's people. But the Ukrainian people are free."

"Donetsk, which I have visited dozens of times? Where I looked in people's faces, in their eyes? Artyoma Street, where I strolled with friends? The Donbas Arena, where I rooted for our boys together with Ukrainian lads at the European Championships? Shcehrbakov Park, where I drank with friends when our boys lost?"

"Luhansk, where the mother of my best friend is buried? Where his father also rests?"

"Many of you have visited Ukraine. Many of you have relatives here. Some might have studied at Ukrainian universities and befriended Ukrainians. You know our character; you know our people, and you know our principles. You know what we value."

"So stop and listen to yourselves, to the voice of reason, to the voice of common sense."

"The Ukrainian people want peace, as does their government. We know for sure that we don't need the war. Not a Cold War, not a hot war. Not a hybrid one. But if these forces attack us, if they try to take our country away from us, our freedom, our lives, the lives of our children, we will defend ourselves.Not attack, but defend ourselves."

"And when you attack, you will see our faces. Not our backs, our faces."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, an appeal to Russia

The mass exodus of refugees from Ukraine to the eastern edge of the European Union showed no signs of stopping Monday as civilians flee Russia’s burgeoning war, with the United Nations estimating that more than half a million people have already escaped. Here, people wait in freezing conditions to board a bus bound for a refugee centre in Przemyśl, Poland, on Monday. (Bryan Woolston/Reuters)

 

Ukrainians are fleeing their country. In staggering numbers, on their way to becoming a full-scale refugee crisis in Europe not seen since the Second World War. A crisis that has been the result of Vladimir Putin's decision to mount a full-scale invasion on his neighbour, knowing full well that imposing the threat and the reality of countless deaths and destruction will inevitably cause hundreds of thousands of people to seek refuge elsewhere than where he has directed his military to strike.

And since he has directed his military to strike wholesale throughout the length and breadth of Ukraine, the response has been disastrous; refugee numbers are exploding from day to day. Several days earlier an estimated 368,000 Ukrainians fled to the borders of their European neighbours; Poland, Hungary, Moldova, Slovakia and Romania, with thousands more desperately attempting to forge their way through clogged borders.

People, frightened and vulnerable, waiting for hours in the cold, in cars, or on foot; with them the bare few belongings they could manage to assemble in their panic to escape. A 14-kilometre-long backlog was assembled at the crossing into Poland two days ago. Some people had been waiting for 40 hours in -18C night-time temperatures.

 

Ukrainian refugees are seen at the temporary refugee centre in a local primary school at Tiszabecs, eastern Hungary on Monday. (Attila Kisbenedek/AFP/Getty Images)

 

In 2015 over a million refugees flooded Europe's borders, coming from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, triggering a continent-wide crisis with some countries willing to accept some refugees and others adamant that they would not. And those that would not take in Muslim refugees fleeing the countries of their birth, beset by horrendous violence from Islamist forces and their very own leaders, are now opening their borders wide to Ukrainian refugees.

Countries such as Slovakia, Hungary and Poland, where their borders had been hardened on that earlier 2015 occasion, assailed by waves of refugees from the Middle East and North Africa are preparing to welcome Ukrainian refugees into their fold. German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser stated Germany was ready to offer Poland and other Eastern European countries support in the handling of the sudden Ukrainian refugee surge.

Up to five million of Ukraine's total 44 million population could become refugees, warns the United Nations, should Russia's attacks on Ukraine continue. For the most part it is women, children and the elderly who mass at the borders, since Ukrainian men have been barred from leaving, in light of President Zelensky having called on Ukrainian males to take up arms in defence of their country.

To complicate matter still further, a data-wiping software has hit a Ukrainian border control station processing people trying to enter Romania, according to a cybersecurity expert. "It's massively hitting the border control. They are processing people with pen and pencil." 

Poland is setting up reception centres along the contiguous 480-kilometre border with Ukraine, offering food, medical care and needed social welfare resources. Thousands of soldiers from the U.S. Army 82nd Airborne Division have been deployed to assist. In 15 hours on Saturday alone, 45,200 Ukrainian refugees crossed into Poland.

Refugees fill a warehouse in Poland after escaping Ukraine.