“War has begun.” Brazilians living in Ukraine woke up this Thursday morning (24) with messages like this, noises of explosions and bombing alarm sirens.
Despite escalating tensions between the Russian and Ukrainian governments in recent days, the attacks took most of them by surprise, especially those living in and around Kiev, hundreds of kilometers from the border and the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.
This is the case of publicist Cristiane Barros Nedashkovskaya, 30, from Pará, who lives in Bila Tserkva, in the Kiev metropolitan region, one of the cities hit by the air strikes.
“I woke up at 5 am with the noise of the explosion, the alarm siren going off because of the shock. Then I heard more explosions, drones flying over. I called Brazilian friends who live here to warn them. It was a desperation, a very tense moment”, he reports.
Married to a Ukrainian and living in the country for a year and a half, Cristiane put a coat over her pajamas and went to try to fill up her car so she could travel to the border with Romania with her mother-in-law, sister-in-law and 1-year-old nephew.
The 58-year-old father-in-law will not be able to go, as Ukrainian men aged between 18 and 65 are banned from leaving the country so they can be drafted into the army. Her husband is working in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, so he is safe.
Cristiane spent hours in line at the gas station. As she waited, she saw seven tanks passing beside her. When it came her turn to fill up, her credit card was blocked.
“There were many cyber-attacks, websites and banking systems went down. Luckily I was already saving dollars at home, I managed to exchange, fill up and buy supplies to put in the car”, he says.
The city exits are congested with cars trying to leave the place. The family should hit the road as soon as daybreak. “It’s going to be a tough night because we won’t be able to sleep a wink.”
A few kilometers away, in Kiev, artist Walther Lang, 47, was awakened by a message from his Ukrainian wife, who is traveling to another city, warning him: “The war has begun.”
He then went to the supermarket to buy food. “There was already a line, a security guard managing the flow of people. There was no purchase limit, but you could only get in when someone was leaving”, he says. “There was also a certain rush to the banks to withdraw money because it is not known if the banking system will work, the cards.”
As he spoke with the report, Walther was preparing to go to a bomb shelter 200 meters from his home. The city government released a map, with options for garages and other underground passages.
“They recommended us to leave the buildings or at least stay on the ground floor, avoid being near windows, as debris and anything flammable can fly,” he says.
According to Walter, the weather in the Ukrainian capital was fairly normal, at least in the morning, but he is considering going to Poland by land and then taking a flight to Brazil. “It could be that in two minutes everything will change, troops will arrive or things will ease up. The Ukrainian army says it has already shot down helicopters, but in Russia they are saying the same thing. It is an information war, all sides say they are winning.”
Poland was also the option chosen by a group of two coaches and seven Brazilian soccer players who are in western Ukraine. The owner of a football academy in a Polish city, Roberto Szymanski, 53, had taken the delegation to train at a resort in the mountains of Lviv, in western Ukraine, in early January.
“We woke up in the morning with the church siren ringing, warning us to be careful because the war started. I tried to contact the embassy from 7 am to 1 pm, but the lines are congested, it is impossible to speak”, he said.
Although there were no attacks in the region where they were, the coach thought it wiser to leave the country together with the athletes, who are between 18 and 23 years old. At great cost, they got a car and a van to take them to the border.
“We had no plans to leave Ukraine, I didn’t believe it would reach the point it has reached today. But I think it will become a very serious thing. We are feeling very insecure about this conflict.”
Embassy guidelines
According to Itamaraty, there are currently around 500 Brazilian citizens in Ukraine. In a note, the Brazilian Foreign Ministry also said that the Brazilian embassy in Kiev has been renewing the registration of Brazilians in the country and transmitting guidelines through online portals.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs also asked that Brazilians in Ukraine, especially those in the east of the country, maintain daily contact with the embassy. “If they need assistance to leave Ukraine, they must follow the embassy’s guidelines and, in the case of residents in the east, move to Kiev as soon as security conditions allow,” the statement reads.
The Brazilian authorities have provided a consular duty number for emergency cases of Brazilians in Ukraine: +55 61 98260-0610.
The Ukrainian embassy in Brazil demanded this Thursday (24) the government of President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) to condemn the invasion of Russia. “We ask, we hope that the Brazilian government makes a statement and condemns this Russian aggression,” the head of the embassy, ​​diplomat Anatolii Tkach, told reporters.
Then, at another point, he was even more emphatic: “First, what we need is a strong signal of condemnation.”
The diplomat said that he is in contact with Brazilian authorities and that he awaits their reaction. He also stated that the country also expects both humanitarian and financial help from allies at this time.
