Polish women are helping Ukrainian refugees navigate their new home and access the services they need
WHEN Russia launched its full-scale invasion on Ukraine in February 2022, it created the fastest-growing European refugee crisis since the Second World War. Millions fled to the country’s western borders, seeking safety and a home in Poland, Romania, Moldova, Germany, France, the UK and elsewhere.
“It is known as the ‘boyfriend model’,” explains Nastya Podorozhnya, a Ukrainian journalist and activist living in Krakow, Poland, and founder of grassroots feminist organisation Martynka. It was at Martynka where, having escaped her abusers, Inna found a sanctuary. “We hear a lot from women who are made to believe they are in a relationship with a man who then assaults them,” adds Nastya .
“They started talking to me about trafficking and how the problem was huge,” she says. Data on the scale of trafficking is hard to come by, due to the hidden nature of the crime, but according to the EU Common Anti-Trafficking Plan, launched months into the full-scale invasion, the threat of trafficking in persons was considered “high and imminent“. The US State Department confirmed that trafficking “likely worsened after Russia launched its all-out war against Ukraine in February 2022”.
“We made online content and put stickers in public bathrooms,” Nastya explains. “We set up a hotline for women and girls to call. Now we have grown to operate a safehouse for women like Inna. She is one of the bravest women I have talked to over this last year and a half.” For women fleeing Ukraine into Poland, and who are pregnant as a result of rape being used as a weapon of war, the chance of accessing an abortion without legal documents proving they have been the victim of sexual abuse are slim.
The details of these horrific crimes seem incongruous, shared as they are in a park in the shadow of Kyiv’s Taras Shevchenko National University. Pairs of men are playing chess on the surrounding tables, and children are playing, but the shadow of war is never far away – Shevchenko’s statue is wrapped in sandbags to protect it from shelling.
“One woman told our partner that she could not tell her husband she was pregnant because he would reject her,” Erika continues. “She was depressed, she was saying how can I tell my husband I have the child of his enemy, the enemy he was fighting back home. They then face this barrier – abortion is available in Ukraine and more flexible, but it is only available in the Polish health system under extreme circumstances.
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