Europe

The Russian Federation’s military offensive against Ukraine launched on 24 February 2022 has triggered one of the fastest-growing refugee emergencies in history, and the largest since World War II. As of 19 April, over 5 million refugees from Ukraine have fled abroad, whilst within Ukraine, some 7.7 million people have been internally displaced and another 8 million are also in urgent need of humanitarian assistance and protection.

Across Ukraine, critical infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed. This has caused total outages of electricity, heating and water in some areas, while other services such as internet connectivity, medical care and public transport have been disrupted. As a result, many people find themselves with no resources or information on where to find safety and accommodation and are unable to meet their basic needs including food, water and medicines. Given the lack of safe humanitarian access, the delivery of life-saving aid is difficult in many areas.

Of the more than 5 million refugees, 90% are women and children. Refugees have mostly fled to neighbouring countries. Most have fled to Poland, but significant numbers have sought safety in Hungary, the Republic of Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, and other countries in the region. These countries have demonstrated extraordinary solidarity, providing immediate assistance to people arriving but the scale of the displacement is putting considerable pressure on available services, and on hosting communities. Of the refugee population, some 2.1 million (as of 20 April) have continued onward to other European countries.

Two months into the fighting, OCHA’s revised initial Flash Appeal outlines the most pressing needs of 15.7 million people inside Ukraine, 7.1 million of whom are IDPs. As per its mandate, UNHCR has in parallel coordinated a ten-month revision to the regional Refugee Response Plan (RRP) for the Ukraine Situation responding to the needs of people who have fled Ukraine. This will support governments in responding to the needs of up to 8.3 million refugees in Hungary, the Republic of Moldova, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and other affected countries, and provide support to hard-pressed host communities.

Given that the emergency has exceeded the worst-case scenario, this revised supplementary appeal for the Ukraine situation outlines UNHCR’s additional requirements of $1.247 billion for March to December 2022.