In a statement on its website, the White House said the plan is part of a larger $1 billion humanitarian aid package to assist all those affected by “Russia’s war in Ukraine.”

The White House said while it expects most Ukrainians will choose to remain in Europe close to family and their homes, the refugees will be welcomed through the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and other usual legal pathways. The statement says it is also looking to expand and develop new programs focusing on Ukrainians who have family members in the United States.

Refugee advocates welcomed the announcements but questioned the administration’s abilities to move refugee processing faster than its current pace.

Sunil Varghese, policy director at the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP), said in a statement the Biden administration is right to respond to the crisis in Ukraine with “compassion” and “bold action,” and advocates await more information on the program.

“Unfortunately, refugee resettlement continues at a glacial pace, and significant investments and innovations are required to ensure the Biden administration’s intentions can be made reality. We look forward to receiving more details about the program to protect vulnerable Ukrainians and encourage the administration to issue a clear plan to fulfill its promise to rebuild the refugee admissions program as a whole,” he wrote.

The U.S. Refugee Admissions program was dramatically cut under the previous Trump administration, leaving fewer resources within the government and resettlement agencies to handle the significant increase of refugee applications and arrivals.

This August 17, 2021, image courtesy of Mohammad Ehsan Saadat shows Ehsan Saadat, a 33-year-old Afghan, who recently arrived in Canada, posing with his wife and his children in Toronto.

In 2021, the Biden administration raised the 2022 refugee cap to 125,000. Yet actual admissions continue to lag, and the White House has acknowledged the “goal will be hard to hit” despite Biden’s determination to rebuild the program and renew “America’s commitment to protect the most vulnerable, and to stand as a beacon of liberty and refuge to the world.”

Cars line up on the road to the Shehyni border crossing as people flee to Poland, after Russia launched a massive military operation against Ukraine, outside Mostyska, Ukraine, Feb. 27, 2022.

But Biden officials say the U.S. government is coordinating closely with the European Union on efforts to help refugees and provide humanitarian transfers and admissions to make sure they are complimentary.

The White House statement said the new humanitarian package will also include funding to ensure food security, shelter, clean water, medical supplies and other forms of assistance for those impacted by “Russia’s aggression.”

The statement says the package includes an additional $320 million in democracy and human rights funding to Ukraine and its neighbors.

The White House says since February 24, the United States has already provided more than $123 million to help Ukraine’s neighboring countries and the European Union receive and host the millions of refugees that have fled the country, with funding split among Poland, Moldova, Romania, Hungary, and the Slovak Republic.

Some information for this report was provided by the Associated Press and Reuters.

Source: https://www.voanews.com/a/white-house-us-to-take-in-100-000-ukrainian-refugees/6499318.html

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Relief work in frontline states – Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary and Moldova – has mainly been shouldered by ordinary citizens volunteering to drive, cook or house refugees, with the help of non-governmental organisations and local authorities.

But with the war now in its third week and the number of refugees swelling, it is becoming difficult to provide sufficient help.

In Krakow, Poland’s second-largest city, one NGO described the situation at the train station as “tragic”.

“There is nowhere to direct the refugees. They are stressed and confused, all kinds of help is needed, and above all, premises,” tweeted Fundacja Brata Alberta, an NGO that in normal times helps individuals with mental disabilities.

In Hrubieszow, a Polish town on the Ukrainian border, Mayor Marta Majewska said she had spent all the town’s crisis reserve of 100,000 zlotys ($22,889), as well as 170,000 zlotys from the local province, to run a refugee reception centre.

“I am most worried about electricity bills,” she told Radio Zet. “The city cannot bear it at all.”

FILLING UP FAST

In Warsaw, the biggest temporary reception centre was about 70% full by Thursday. Refugees now make up over 10% of the Polish capital’s population, Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski said.

Close to 4,000 Ukrainian children are now attending school in Warsaw, he added, with city authorities setting up 76 “preparatory classes” in which they learn Polish.

Trzaskowski separately called for other nations to step in, urging airlifts and a global system to manage the influx.

“We’re getting overwhelmed… We cannot improvise anymore,” he told U.S. television network MSNBC. “We need relocation in Europe and we need relocation in the world.”

U.S. President Joe Biden said on Friday the United States would welcome those fleeing the conflict.

“We’re going to welcome Ukraine refugees with open arms if in fact they come all the way here,” he told a group of U.S. lawmakers. He gave no details.

In Przemysl, near Poland’s busiest border crossing and a transit hub for refugees, Vice-Mayor Boguslaw Swiezy said he was seeing a decline in the number of volunteers, some of whom are students, others people taking time off work.

The Polish government will start reimbursing local governments’ costs for handling refugees from next week, once a new law comes into force, the interior ministry said.

Romania’s capital Bucharest was turning a convention centre and indoor arena, Romexpo, into its biggest refugee shelter yet, while Hungary was studying whether to turn museums, sports arenas and public buildings in Budapest into shelters.

The Hungarian government is also providing subsidies to employers who take on refugees to help cover accommodation and travel costs. In the Czech Republic, Prague mayor Zdenek Hrib called for more government funds to help accommodate refugees.

‘I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO NEXT’

And the refugees just keep arriving.

Dasha, a 31-year-old psychotherapist from Kyiv, arrived on Friday at Medyka, Poland’s busiest border crossing with Ukraine, where temperatures overnight dropped to -9 degrees Celsius (15.8 degrees Fahrenheit).

She left Kyiv on the first day of the invasion and stayed in the western city of Lviv but has now left Ukraine on the advice of her husband, who is in the army reserve.

“It’s tough in Kyiv, they are encircling the city,” she told Reuters, with two little dogs on their leashes.

“I’m going to Wroclaw (in southwest Poland), I have some friends there,” she said before bursting into tears. “I don’t know what to do next.”

Inna, a 55-year old woman fleeing Dnipropetrovsk, said she had travelled 24 hours to reach Medyka.

“My town was bombed this morning… I just can’t talk, I am so overwhelmed,” she sobbed.

She did not know where she would spend Friday night.

The United Nations bases its relief plans on 4 million people fleeing abroad, but has said it may need to revise the number higher.

The Polish Border Guard said 1.5 million people had entered Poland from Ukraine since Russia began its invasion on Feb. 24.

Nearly 365,000 people have so far fled into Romania, 219,000 to Hungary and 176,000 to Slovakia, officials said. Nearly 200,000 have reached the Czech Republic, which does not share a border with Ukraine.

Others are reaching or are seen getting to German, Sweden and other countries in Western Europe.

Russia calls its actions in Ukraine a special military operation to disarm its neighbour and dislodge its “neo-Nazi” leaders. Kyiv and its Western allies say this is a baseless pretext to invade a country of 44 million people.

(Additional reporting by Mari Saito in Medyka, Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk in Warsaw, Luiza Ilie in Bucharest, Robert Muller in Prague, Anita Komuves and Krisztina Than in Budapest, Jeff Mason in Washington; Writing by Gwladys Fouche, additional writing by Susan Heavey; Editing by Gareth Jones and Angus MacSwan),

Source: https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2022-03-11/eastern-europes-aid-effort-under-strain-as-ukraine-refugees-keep-arriving

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FAST FACTS
—Residents of Mariupol, Ukraine, have reportedly contacted a human rights organization with complaints that Russian forces have occupied an intensive care hospital.

—Three European leaders are expected to travel to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Tuesday before a 35-hour curfew for civilians takes effect as Russian forces advance and the city is under sustained shelling.

—The United Nations says nearly 3 million people have fled Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said Tuesday that sanctions it’s imposing on President Biden and other top U.S. officials are “the inevitable consequence of the extremely Russophobic course taken by the current U.S. Administration.”

“In response to a series of unprecedented sanctions prohibiting, among other things, entry into the United States for top officials of the Russian Federation… the Russian ‘stop list’ includes on the basis of reciprocity President Biden, Secretary of State Blinken, Secretary of Defense Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Milley, as well as a number of departmental heads and well-known American figures,” it said in a statement.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, Hunter Biden and Hillary Clinton are also among those Russia says it is sanctioning.

“This step, taken as a counter reaction, was the inevitable consequence of the extremely Russophobic course taken by the current U.S. Administration, which, in a desperate attempt to maintain American hegemony, has staked, discarding all decency, on the frontal containment of Russia,” it added.

Source:  https://www.foxnews.com/live-news/ukraine-russia-live-updates-03-15-2022

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