Due to the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation, millions of Ukrainians, including children, were forced to leave their homes. In particular, Ukrainians are fleeing the war and abroad.. On the difficulties that arise when evacuating children abroad, in an interview with ZN. UA was told by the presidential adviser for children's rights and children's rehabilitation Daria Gerasimchuk. Alla Kotlyar talked to her.
The Commissioner said that with the financial support of UNICEF, the Coordinating Headquarters for the Protection of Children's Rights in wartime traveled to countries that host the most of our children - to Poland, Germany and Italy. They looked at how Ukrainian children were accommodated, how they got there, who evacuated, what provided. First of all, we are talking about organized groups.. Also, members of the headquarters, including Gerasimchuk, met with government agencies of these countries.
“The biggest problem is that the legislation of Ukraine on certain issues does not coincide with the legislation of the EU countries. For example, in Ukraine, a child from 16 to 18 years old can travel freely and does not need to be accompanied. In EU countries, a child under 18 needs an accompanying person. A child from 16 to 18 years old who left Ukraine without problems is considered an unaccompanied child in other countries, and a temporary guardian is assigned to him. And this is a problem, because the citizens of Ukraine do not understand who a temporary guardian is and what powers he has in relation to children,” Gerasimchuk said..
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She called the situation with family forms of education another problem.. Indeed, in Ukraine there are a large number of them - a foster family, a foster family, a family of guardians, trustees, a family-type orphanage (DDST).
“In the EU countries, there is only one form - the foster family. It is difficult for the governments of these countries to understand our diversity.. In Italy, for example, they do not understand what DDST is, who are parent-educators and what powers they have.. Therefore, they again appoint their temporary guardian. This has certain difficulties, because the family has already been formed, dad and mom are educators. They are very worried and do not know how to treat the appointed guardian, ”explained the authorized.
Gerasimchuk indicated that representatives of the headquarters faced different situations. In particular, a family traveling abroad should understand where and with whom they are going.. After all, according to the representative, there are cases when volunteers and organizations of various directions offered help to people, promised that they would bring them to a good place, provide escort, translation.
“They really brought, settled, and then left without escort and translation. Meanwhile, the language barrier creates many different problems.. It is difficult for people to understand how to arrange social payments, get support, how to arrange a child for school. That is, people rashly agree without considering all the scenarios for the development of events, and then they often remain silent about it. First of all,"
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And secondly, as the authorized representative noted, parents-educators or guardians know if they cross the border, they are obliged to put all children on consular registration within one day. According to her, Ukraine must clearly understand where the child is and where to pick him up from.. However, there are cases when an organization that brought people with children abroad assured them that there is no need to register with the consular office, because this is a lot of problems.. And then the family is persuaded to move to another country. For example, from Germany to America.
“Fathers-educators are very worried and do not understand what to do next, because they received approval from the authorized body in Ukraine to move to this country, and not another. Such problematic situations arise when people do not fully know their rights and obligations and are “led” to the not very fair games of various organizations and the volunteers who took them out,” summed up Gerasimchuk.
It should be noted that the Coordination Headquarters for the protection of children's rights in wartime includes 11 ministries, people's deputies of the Verkhovna Rada, various departments and representatives of the public sector, international organizations, experts. It informs the citizens of Ukraine how they need to act, what documents to prepare and what to check when entering another country, with whom to keep in touch. Consular registration is a must.
It was reported that more than 650 children suffered in Ukraine as a result of a full-scale armed aggression of the Russian Federation. According to official figures from juvenile prosecutors, 229 children died and more than 421 were injured.