Full-scale war has torn millions of Ukrainians from their homes and forced them to start their lives from scratch far from their native places. More than 5.8 million of our citizens have been forced to seek refuge abroad since 2022 alone. Most often — in Germany, Poland, Italy, Spain, Austria, Switzerland, Finland and Norway.
These are not dry statistics or lines in reports — these are real people who have been forced to leave their homes and loved ones because of Russian aggression, and for whom life in another country is almost never easy. For many of them, the following key problems have become a daily reality:
- long queues for consular services: access to them is sometimes only possible after six months;
- digital services remain inaccessible to older people;
- there are serious difficulties with pensions due to a lack of information about remote identification and the complexity of confirming employment history;
- issues of disability recognition and foreign medical documents remain unresolved;
- сomplex procedures for recognising foreign diplomas effectively block employment in one’s profession.
Separate monitoring trips have shown that there are conflicts within Ukrainian communities abroad, particularly regarding language. There is also competition between “old” diaspora organisations and new associations of migrants. There is also inequality between different regions within the same country — for example, different rules for social benefits in Austria or Switzerland. It should not be forgotten that in 2025 we saw a new wave of migration — due to strikes on the energy sector, hostilities and the permission for men aged 18–22 to leave the country.
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Most importantly, Ukrainians abroad are not a separate community, but part of society. And they have every right to support from their state.
The Ombudsman’s Office is consistently building a systematic approach to protecting the rights of our citizens. With the support of the Council of Europe project, in 2025 we travelled to six European countries, visited nine centres for Ukrainian refugees, and held four open meetings with Ukrainian communities. We also held 12 legal awareness webinars in 12 countries around the world where the largest number of Ukrainian citizens live.
My key conclusions from this work are as follows:
- the issue of protecting Ukrainians abroad requires a systematic approach, in particular the adoption of a state strategy;
- there is an urgent need to improve inter-agency coordination;
- the state must plan its policy for the period after the temporary protection expires in 2027;
- the return of Ukrainians will only be possible if there are clear mechanisms for reintegration.
These conclusions are particularly important for the development of state policy to support citizens abroad.
The war has forced millions of people to seek safety, but it does not deprive them of their rights. Our task is to see these problems, talk about them openly and seek solutions!
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Forced mobilisation in temporarily occupied territories: a crime that the world has already condemned
