“The wisest choice is to leave Ukraine now”: at Boryspil airport in Kiev, Moroccan entrepreneur Aimrane Bouziane consults the board of departure flights with relief: his is maintained.
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The situation at the airport is calm, travelers are having coffees and eating desserts while waiting for their flight, but the context is far from relaxed.
AFP
The Ukrainian government has promised to keep the airspace open, but the Dutch company KLM has already suspended all flights to the country the day before. With 130,000 Russian soldiers massed on the Ukrainian border, the Americans warn that the invasion can occur at “any time and without warning”, while Germany considers the situation “critical”.
British Defense Minister Ben Wallace said on Sunday that there was a “scent of Munich in the air” in this crisis, in reference to the 1938 agreement with Nazi Germany which could not prevent World War II.
“Yes, I’m leaving because of the situation, because I’m afraid for my life,” says Aimrane Bouziane, 23. “What can happen? An invasion. (Russian President Vladimir) Putin might invade. He’s done it before, so he can do it again.”
Denis Lucins, American football coach, returns from the United States to find his wife and 7-year-old son who live in Mykolaiv, in the south of Ukraine, ignoring the recommendations of Washington which asks its nationals to leave the country.
“There is a certain level of concern. But you know, I lived here in 2014, I saw the annexation of Crimea, the conflict in Donbass. Let’s wait to see what will happen. Where I live, in Mykolaiv, we hope nothing bad will happen,” he said.
While US President Joe Biden is considered too alarmist, including by the Ukrainian authorities, Denis Lucins believes that his strategy is good. “He was right when he said a few months ago, ‘Wait, but there are 100,000 Russian troops at the border. I think it’s good that the United States said “You can’t invade”. Then Britain and the others followed.
“Personally, I don’t think anything will happen, but unfortunately no one can read Vladimir Putin’s mind.”
AFP
For Armenian traveler Armen Vartanian, 36, Kiev is nothing to fear.
“I think Putin could take a little more from the East”, where the Ukrainian army has been fighting since 2014 pro-Russian separatists backed by Moscow, who control part of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions in the Donbass coal basin.
“Donbass, yes, it is already separated, they use the ruble, the Russian troops are already there. (Putin) could take it,” said Mr. Vartanian. But “Russian troops in Kiev? No, I don’t think that will happen. It would be the Third World War, it’s too much”.
Boryspil airport communications manager Olexander Demchyk is reassuring. “The situation is what it is. It’s really tense, but we don’t feel any panic. I think everything will be fine”.