Ukrainian refugees flee Donetsk region as fighting continues on the Pokrovsk front

Record ID: 1987179

  • Title: Ukrainian refugees flee Donetsk region as fighting continues on the Pokrovsk front
  • Date: 1st April 2025
  • Summary: PAVLOHRAD, UKRAINE (MARCH 31, 2025) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF UKRAINIAN INTERNALLY DISPLACED PEOPLE (IDP) AT THEATRE TURNED INTO IDP TRANSIT CENTRE VARIOUS OF MEN WATCHING MOVIE PEOPLE ON COTS VARIOUS OF DISPLACED PERSON, KATERYNA BOYAROVA, WITH AID WORKERS BOYAROVA'S CAT, ABU (SOUNDBITE) (Russian) DISPLACED PERSON AND FORMER NURSE FROM KOSTIANTYNIVKA, CURRENTLY UNEMPLOYED, KAT
  • Embargoed:
  • Keywords: Donetsk IDP Internally displace people Kostiantynivka Russia Sloviansk Vladimir Putin ceasefire internal migration refugee
  • Location: PAVLOHRAD, UKRAINE
  • City: PAVLOHRAD, UKRAINE
  • Country: Ukraine
  • Topics: Conflicts/War/Peace,Europe,Military Conflicts
  • Reuters ID: LVA001307131032025RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: As fighting continues on the Pokrovsk frontline, more internally displaced residents of the Donetsk region trickled into a makeshift transit centre in the eastern Ukrainian town of Pavlohrad on Monday (March 31).
    Each day, about 70 people fleeing shelling and fighting in the region show up at a local theatre turned into a temporary shelter.
    "When you open your eyes and you realise that a rocket is heading towards you, it makes you anxious and forces you to do things you would not normally do," said 24-year-old Kateryna Boyarova, who left Kostiantynivka, 45 kilometres (28 miles) away from the besieged city of Pokrovsk.
    Russian forces have for months focused on advancing on the logistics hub and site of a coking coal mine which halted operations in January as Moscow's troops got closer.
    But Ukraine's military has reported success in recent weeks in holding back Russian forces in the area.
    Shelling and strikes however convince more and more residents to leave their homes every day.
    "It was very tough. Just imagine, leaving everything behind, all your possessions. I had a large apartment, I left everything behind, I abandoned it all," said Serhii Managarov, a pensioner from Myrne after being evacuated from his village.
    Mangarov said he had no intention to go back to his home.
    "Who is going to take it? I do not know, I do not care anymore,” he said.
    Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022 has left hundreds of thousands of dead and injured, displaced millions of people and reduced towns to rubble.
    Prospects for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine brokered by U.S. President Donald Trump appear to be fading and no reduction of hostilities has been achieved since the start of negotiations weeks ago.
    Asked about hopes for peace, Managarov expressed what seems to be an increasingly common sentiment.
    "I think there will not be any peace. This is my opinion, my view. They will not make peace, neither Putin nor Zelenskiy," he said.
    But Alla Ryantseva, aid coordinator at the Pavlohrad centre, wants to believe that Ukraine's armed forces will push back Russian troops.
    "I wish there was no need for centres like this one. I would rather there were de-occupation centres. We would be ready to work 24/7 welcoming people who are returning," she said.
    (Production: Manuel Ausloos, Volodymyr Pavlov, Anna Dabrowska)
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