Kiev, Europe Brief News, hundreds of Afghan families found themselves forced to flee Ukraine after fleeing Afghanistan.
After leaving Afghanistan a year ago, Ajmal Rahmani believed he had found a haven of peace in Ukraine.
This week, he and his Afghan family had to flee again, this time to Poland.
“I run from one war, come to another country and another war starts. Very bad luck,” Rahmani told AFP shortly after crossing the border.
His seven-year-old daughter Marwa clutched a beige-coloured soft toy dog as Rahmani spoke.
Together with Marwa, his wife Mina and son Omar, 11, the family walked the last 30km (18 miles) to the crossing on foot because of the gridlock on the Ukrainian side of the border.
After arriving in Medyka, the family waited with other refugees for a bus to take them to Przemysl.
Hundreds of thousands of people have fled during the four days of conflict into neighbouring countries, mainly Poland, Hungary and Romania. The United Nations’ refugee agency (UNHCR) says more than 500,000 people have fled Ukraine, nearly 300,000 of them entering Poland.
While most of the refugees are Ukrainian, among them are also students and migrant workers from further afield, including Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, India and Nepal.
Rahmani, who is in his 40s, said he worked for NATO in Afghanistan for 18 years at Kabul airport.
He decided to leave the country four months before the US withdrawal after receiving threats. The Afghan Taliban group returned to power last August, 20 years after it was toppled in a US-led NATO invasion.
“I had a good life in Afghanistan, I had a private house, I had a private car, I had a good salary.” “I sold my car, my house, my everything, I lost everything.”
Half a Million Flee War in Ukraine
Ukraine was the only country that would grant the family a visa. They set up home in Odesa, a Black Sea port city.
When Russia began its invasion of Ukraine on Thursday, they left everything again and travelled to the border.
More than half a million people have fled their homes to escape the war in Ukraine, the UN said Monday.
The UN said millions of civilians were being forced to huddle in makeshift bomb shelters such as underground rail stations to escape explosions.
Since the invasion began last Thursday, her office has recorded 102 civilian deaths, including seven children – and more than 300 injured.
