Press gallery // NRC starting up response in Poland

Victoria at the Przemysl train station.

Victoria (26) fled from Zorya, a village between Nicolaev and Kherson. She came a long way with her three children, before finally crossing to Poland, where we meet them at a Przemysl train station together with other women and children from their area who joined them on a strenuous journey: “Only documents, the emergency bag which was ready to go, that’s all we took.” Her husband had to stay behind.

Before they decided to flee, Victoria and her children tried to seek refuge in another place in Ukraine: “They started bombing the village daily - when the gasline was broken, and all the children were already sitting in the basements. On 11 March, at 5 a.m. in the morning, we were bombed again. We requested to be evacuated the same day.” Evacuated through a “green corridor,” they reached Lviv on 17 March, just to immediately cross to Poland, a final stop on the way to their destination in Czechia. The woman tells us that they do not have anyone there, but since she used to work there, she hopes she will be able to make her way around the country.

Victoria says that when the war is over, she wants to come back to Ukraine, “At least to see what has happened to the country; if there’s at least two houses that survived, it would be good.” An elderly woman in the group, standing nearby, suddenly bursts out into tears: “There is nothing there, nothing,” she cries.

“Right now we got all the help we need in Poland, except accommodation, because we had been told that everything is already full here. And that’s why we are trying to make it to Czech Republic today before it gets dark.”

Victoria’s older daughter comes up and gives us a piece of chocolate, one she got from relief items. She does not take “no, thank you” for an answer, willing to share with everyone around.

Photo: Ingebjørg Kårstad/NRC