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Assignment: Evacuated to Russia

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Evacuated to Russia

09/06/2022 GMT

BBC World Service - Assignment, Evacuated to Russia

Has Russia rescued a million Ukrainian refugees? Or deported them in another war crime?

More than a million refugees from the war in Ukraine have ended up in the arms of the enemy, Russia. Have they been rescued? Or illegally deported in another Kremlin war crime?

More than a million Ukrainian civilians from Mariupol and other war-ravaged towns in the east of the country have been transported over the border into the territory of their country’s enemy, Russia. The authorities there have dispersed them into a chain of “temporary accommodation centres” across Russia, some of them thousands of miles from Ukraine. Russia claims it’s rescued the refugees – and says some want to build new lives with Russian citizenship in places as far away as Vladivostok, on the Pacific Ocean. But many of the Ukrainians are trying to avoid or leave the accommodation centres, and get out of Russia – and they’re being helped by a network of volunteers inside and outside the country. Ukraine says many of the “evacuees” have been forcibly deported to Russia against their will – and they’re being subjected to a form of slavery in sealed camps. Tim Whewell talks to refugees in Russia – and others who’ve managed to leave the country – to try to find out what’s really going on.

Image: A temporary accommodation centre for evacuees, including residents of the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, in the building of a local sports school in Taganrog in the Rostov region, Russia on March 17, 2022 (Credit: Maxim Romanov/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

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