By Lianne Kolirin
British people are being urged to step up their support for Ukrainian refugees as the first anniversary of the Russian invasion of their country approaches.
The British public donated £400m to the Disasters Emergency Committee’s Ukraine appeal in the year since war broke out on 24 February 2022, with the government match-funding £25m of that.
Christian Aid is one of the charities helping to channel these critical funds where they are most needed. Peter Robertson, a senior journalist on humanitarian aid from the charity, joined an online panel discussion hosted by the Religion Media Centre.
The debate came hours after a state of the nation address by President Putin of Russia in which he ramped up his aggressive rhetoric and suspended a landmark nuclear arms control treaty. Mr Robertson said that while there was “no end in sight” to the conflict, the appeal had been “record-breaking” and showed “the amazing generosity of the British public and their desire to help”.
Mr Robertson, recently returned from a trip to Ukraine where he reported from the front line, said Christian Aid had been working with what he described as “accidental humanitarians” — ordinary Ukrainians whose lives have been transformed by the conflict and who are now committed to helping their compatriots.
“These are people who have themselves been supported but are now putting themselves back into society and are now helping other people,” he said. The humanitarian situation in Ukraine is in a state of flux. There are still people who need help. There are still people trying to move out of the country and there are many people now returning to the country.”
Of the five million people who had been internally displaced within the country, he said: “It’s a complicated situation.” Their plight, he said, has moved beyond food and shelter to “psycho-social support” for the many dimensions of living in a country torn by war.
Grassroots-level churches had been “critical” in supporting the population, he told the online gathering.
The same could be said of here in the UK, according to Dr Krish Kandiah, a social entrepreneur who has been instrumental in helping to mobilise churches and civil society groups in supporting refugees arriving in Britain from Ukraine.
Eight million people have fled Ukraine and more than 150,000 of them have been housed in the UK — mostly in residential settings.
In research released today (Thursday), Dr Kandiah’s charity, Sanctuary Foundation, polled almost 2,000 of these Ukrainians about life in Britain over the past year. The survey found that 99 per cent of refugees were grateful to be in the UK but many faced huge challenges over employment, housing, and communication in English.
Nine per cent said they planned to say in UK permanently, while more than twice as many (19 per cent) said they definitely planned to return home at some point.
“Ukrainians are really glad to be here and are grateful to the public,” Dr Kandiah said. However, he added, many felt that the search for “meaningful work” remained a challenge that had led to “people feeling disrespected”. Finding more permanent accommodation once the initial stay with their host family was over could also be problematic.
While campaigners hope to work with the government to alleviate some of these difficulties, they also hope to recruit more households willing to host.
“It isn’t too late for people to be part of this historic welcome,” Dr Kandiah said. “The situation in many parts of Ukraine is much worse now. People are less willing to offer that help but it’s needed more than ever.”
While he hopes for the best, Dr Kandiah said he “feared the worst”, adding: “We must be ready to support people for the long term.”
The Orthodox church in Ukraine has split, with the Russian Orthodox now banned after Patriarch Kirill supported the war, and the Ukrainian Orthodox church is growing at home and finding its place in the diaspora.
The conflict with Russia has led to deep divisions within the Orthodox church, explained Sergei Chapnin, from the Orthodox Christian studies centre at Fordham University, New York.
Mr Chapnin, a scholar and former deputy editor-in-chief of Moscow Patriarchate publishing house, told the meeting that many within the Russian church had backed Putin’s war.
“Quite a lot of the bishops and priests have mentioned the desire for victory and support for the Russian military,” he said. “Patriarch Kirill pretends to be the leader not only of the Russian church in the territory of the Russian Federation but also in the post-Soviet space but he’s definitely losing his position.”
Father Myroslav Pushkaruk is establishing Ukrainian Orthodox parishes here in Britain. Speaking through an interpreter, he said his role was “to provide spiritual guidance and spiritual support for all Ukrainians coming now and those living here for a long time”, and he also hoped to secure a base for the congregation.
Father Taras Khomych is a priest of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and senior lecturer in early Christian literature and Byzantine theology at Liverpool Hope University. He has organised a solidarity vigil to mark the anniversary in Liverpool on Friday.
Giving his outlook for the future, he said: “Now many people returned to Ukraine, returned to Kyiv and even yesterday, President Biden came to Kyiv. So, I think some sort of normality is returning. But it’s not yet a permanent state.
“And obviously, with the war, the situation is so dynamic, and so unpredictable, that we cannot make far-reaching predictions about what will happen in the near future.”
