BEREGSURANY: The mass exodus of refugees from Ukraine to the eastern edge of the European Union showed no signs of stopping Monday, with the UN estimating that more than 500,000 people have already escaped Russia’s burgeoning war against Ukraine.

Long lines of cars and buses were backed up at checkpoints at the borders of Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania and non-EU member Moldova. Others crossed the borders on foot, dragging their possessions away from the war and into the security of the EU.

Several hundred refugees were gathered at a temporary reception center in the Hungarian border village of Beregsurany awaiting transportation to transit hubs, where they could be taken further into Hungary and beyond.

Maria Pavlushko, 24, an information technology project manager from Zhytomyr, a city around 100 kilometers west of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, said she had been on a skiing holiday in the Carpathian mountains when she got word from home last week that Russias invasion had begun.

My granny called me saying there is war in the city, she said.

Published in Dawn, March 1st, 2022