Based on recent evidence from the United Nation’s International Organisation for Migration, the following countries have received the majority of refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine:
- Poland has taken in 3,463,320 refugees
- Romania 943,015 (as of 19 May)
- Russia 887,651 (19 May)
- Hungary 633,219
- Moldova 468,998
- Slovakia 435,660
- Belarus 27,308 (12 May)
- Czech Republic has issued some 350,000 emergency visas to Ukrainian refugees
- Germany currently hosts more than 700,000 Ukrainians (predominantly children)
Of those refugees that first arrived in Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, many have now moved on to other European Union member states, since the former three have no border controls with other parts of the EU’s Schengen area, therefore, further stretching the European Union’s capacity to host migrants.
Although the Temporary Protection Directive, adopted unanimously by the Council of the European Union in March 2022, has helped facilitate the movement of Ukrainian refugees throughout the European Union, it has become evident that it is now necessary to reshape the European Union’s migration and asylum policies. The arrival of millions of Ukrainian refugees on European Union territory is not without challenges, however, as the risk of an increase of trafficking in persons is very much likely. Traffickers can more easily exploit the vulnerable status of those fleeing the war, therefore, posing a very serious risk to security, with border agencies already overstretched to accommodate the needs of millions of refugees crossing Ukraine’s borders at several different points.
Yet recently, the United Nations stated that some two million Ukrainians have now returned home, as certain parts of the country are now safer to live in. While it is certainly promising the fact that people feel safe enough to return to their homes, this mass movement of people from Ukraine to the European Union and their subsequent return to Ukraine within the space of a few months only may well pose several questions, again, regarding the European Union’s migration and asylum policies and practices, not to mention the security challenges that lie ahead. Border control agencies will soon require more and better resources, facilities, equipment and training to tackle more effectively similar phenomena in the future.
Christos Kassimeris, PhD
Professor Christos Kassimeris heads the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at European University Cyprus and is coordinator of the BA in European Politics and Communication. Before joining European University Cyprus, he was teaching European Integration Politics and International Relations of the Mediterranean for three years at the University of Reading. He is the author of European Football in Black and White: Tackling Racism in Football (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2007), Greece and the American Embrace: Greek Foreign Policy Towards Turkey, the US and the Western Alliance (I.B. Tauris Academic Studies, 2009) and Football Comes Home: Symbolic Identities in European Football (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers 2010), editor of Anti-racism in European Football: Fair Play for All (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2009), The Marketing of War in the Age of Neo-Militarism (Routledge, 2011) and The Politics of Education: Challenging Multiculturalism (Routledge, 2011), and has several publications in political science journals. He is also Visiting Research Fellow at the University of De Montfort.
