In the reception center for Ukrainians in Paris, managed by the association France Terre d’Asile (FTDA), 200 people have been coming every day since Thursday to find help and a place in emergency accommodation.
© THOMAS COEX / AFP
Irina, 69, devours the bowl of chocolate cereal on her lap. Her first meal since she left her native Ukraine to find herself in Paris: “I fled without looking where I was going. I just wanted them not to kill me”. Gray hair, haggard blue eyes, dark coat that falls to her feet, the one who lived a week ago still in a village near Dnipro (center) still cannot explain how she finds herself this Monday morning in a reception center for Ukrainian refugees in Paris.
A few days following the start of the Russian invasion, she left her region with her son, sitting by her side, towards Poland, from where a bus ended up dropping her off in front of this center called “Accueil Ukraine”, in the north of the capital. In France, she has “neither family nor friends”, she says. But his future is written there: “Go back? And what will I find there?”
In the reception center managed by the association France Terre d’Asile (FTDA), 200 people have been coming every day since Thursday to find help and a place of emergency accommodation. “Hotels are mobilized as arrivals arrive. Every day, reception capacities increase with regard to needs”, underlines Delphine Rouilleault, general manager of FTDA.
Paris is mobilizing for Ukraine and its nationals.
With @OmelchenkoVadymat the visitor center opened by @Franceterdasile at # Paris18 in connection with the City and the State. Here, Ukrainian refugees benefit from listening and support for all their procedures. pic.twitter.com/MS3MXisJ8E
– Anne Hidalgo (@Anne_Hidalgo) March 5, 2022
“I want to go home”…
Svetlana Sniegur and her elderly parents, who arrived the day before, ask for nothing more. They too left Dnipro five days ago, eight years following having already fled Donetsk, one of the pro-Russian separatist territories. Once in Poland, Svetlana’s daughter, Maria Sniegur, an architect for four years in Paris, was waiting for them in the car. Svetlana Sniegur thanks “the French people” who welcome them “with kindness”. She even plans to learn French. But the family hopes to return to Ukraine as soon as possible: “I hope for victory. I want to go home, this is my land. I don’t want to stay here”. In the immediate future, she explains with moist eyes, the Ukrainians will also need “psychological” help, following “the horrors” committed by the Russian “terrorist aggressors”.
Of the 1.5 million Ukrainians who have already fled the war, only around 4,000 have arrived in France, according to the Interior Ministry. After a historic agreement of the 27, they benefit in the European Union from “temporary protection”, which exempts them from an asylum request to find themselves in a regular situation.
It is to “open the right to this protection” that agents from the French Office for Immigration and Integration (Ofii) and the police headquarters will settle in the reception area on Tuesday, indicated Didier Leschi, boss of the Ofii. “This protection for six months renewable up to three years offers more things than the status of asylum seeker”, he underlines, in particular immediate access to care (universal health protection) and to the labor market. .
…”if Ukraine remains Ukraine”
They will also be able to receive the asylum seeker’s allowance (Ada, between 6 and 14 euros per day). “The idea is that a person who shows up in the morning comes out in the evening with an accommodation offer, an Ada card and a temporary residence permit”, continues Delphine Rouilleault. A provision that also applies to non-Ukrainians who had been residing in the country for a long time at the start of the conflict.
A relief for Moussa Kanté, a Malian who left Kharkiv (the country’s second city) last Monday with his Ukrainian wife Yana and their 4-year-old daughter. “We left when the bombardments became too intense. Living there was no longer possible,” says the 33-year-old father. He has a sister in France and speaks French. The family rode until 1:00 a.m. overnight from Sunday to Monday. “Ten years of a constructed life that we abandoned in one day”, he summarizes.
“We are relieved to be here, but worried for those who might not leave and of whom we have no news,” he said, while his wife remained prostrate. For them too, a return to Ukraine remains the priority. “If Ukraine remains Ukraine,” he nuances. “Under the Russians, it’s not even worth it.”
