David Culot looked at the timetables and fares, and here is the calculation: it should cost him “a hundred euros” to take the train “in the next few days” to the Carpathian mountains, on the Romanian border, for him, his wife and their three children aged 1, 4 and 7 years old. The Frenchman, who has been living in Ukraine since the end of the 2000s, has “much need to breathe” right now. To tell the truth, the Culot family had no “not quite planned” to take to the air so soon. But the speech of Vladimir Putin, who recognized the independence of the pro-Russian separatist territories of Ukraine and ordered his army “keeping the peace”Monday, February 21, accelerated things.
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It is that Kharkiv, where the entrepreneur has his activities, is located twenty-five short kilometers from the Russian border and 250 from the Donbass region, in the east of the country, where hundreds of soldiers Russians are massaged. “It will be good for everyoneblows the 51-year-old father. There’s a lot of stress right now. We have to get out of this worry. Safety first”.
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Maxime Jochum also did not think of visiting his in-laws in the middle of February. But it’s good from home, Svitlovodsk, to 300 kilometers west of Kharkiv where he usually lives, the 30-year-old followed the Russian president’s speech. “With my wife, we had set a red line: ‘If the French authorities tell us to leave the place, we leave’. And that moment has arrived, so we left”says the computer scientist from Annemasse (Haute-Savoie).
It was indeed a message signed by the French Embassy in Ukraine, on February 19, which precipitated everything. “French nationals in the oblasts of Kharkiv, Luhansk and Donetsk, formally advised against, and as a precaution in the Dnipro region, are called upon to leave these areas without delay. could we read. Maxime and his wife are left the next morning at 9 a.m., by bus, each with a bag, a computer to work with and a few spare things.
The message from the French Embassy acted as a click, as if one more safety notch had suddenly jumped. French nationals broke their piggy bank to urgently buy a plane ticket to Paris. David Franck, adviser to French nationals living abroad in Kiev, landed at Roissy airport on Sunday evening. “The plane was full. But I did not find that there was particular panic among the passengers. On the other hand, it was the last Air France flight”, he says. The airline announced that it was suspending flights between Paris and Kiev until February 26.
On board, with him, were expatriates who had received orders from their companies to pack up. But also the director of the Alliance Française of Kharkiv, or the principal of the French school Anne of Kiev and her husband. David Franck also recognized embassy employees, accompanied by their spouses and children. “A good part” of the thousand French people registered on the electoral rolls have already left the country, a diplomatic source told franceinfo, without further details. According to our information, they were still 350 on the territory Tuesday noon.
And those who chose to stay? These are not “not fools however”and it is a decision “very personal”wants to call back David Franck. “We must leave the choice to everyone. That’s what I told the minister” responsible for French nationals abroad, Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, with whom the adviser for French nationals living abroad in Kiev is in permanent contact. The French Embassy in the Ukrainian capital has not moved from the street Reitarska. Even with a reduced workforce, ethe rest “open and active”, we are assured. Mr. Ambassador, Etienne de Poncins even tweeted that he was still there.
I confirm. We stay in Kyiv
— Etienne de Poncins (@EdePoncins) February 19, 2022
Embassy employees have the mission of being in contact with nationals who have remained in Ukraine. Not a luxury: on the Facebook group of the French living in Kiev, some continue to wonder about what they should do. “Hello French people from Ukraine, what do you think of the information from France saying to leave Ukraine? I would like your opinion… I haven’t made a decision, but I would like to take the temperature of other people…”writes a user.
A French entrepreneur living in the Ukrainian capital for two years (who prefers to remain anonymous) hears the same thoughts at the coffee machine. “It is sure that the French are talking even more about the situation at the moment, he details. In the office, it is the number one subject. Everyone asks ‘And you, what are you doing?’, ‘Are you staying, are you leaving?’ It’s like in life, there are optimists and pessimists. Me, for the moment, I stay “.
The worst part is that sometimes it’s not what’s happening at the end of the street that causes the anxiety to rise. “I had my sister on the phone. She lives in France and she was worried about me. She asked me what we were going to do, if we were going to leave”says David Culot. “I have also received messages from friends based in Austria, in the United States, old customers, who tell me that they are worried about me.”
“And then leave, but leave where? My whole life is here. My family, my children’s school, my hobbies, my professional activities…”
David Culotat franceinfo
Another question remains: for how long to go green? David Culot thinks to pass “one short week” with his family in the Carpathians before returning to Kharkiv. Maxime Jochum did not “not yet taken his return ticket” but his plan, for now, is to “only stay a few days” at his in-laws. David Franck has not looked at flights in the Paris-Kiev direction either. But one thing is certain : “Even if Air France does not resume its rotations, I will travel by bus or train. My life is there.” He cuts : “I can’t believe Putin’s madness goes so far as to bomb Kyiv.”
David Franck hangs up his phone. He must anticipate the organization of the resumption of classes at the French Lycée Anne de Kiev. For the moment, it is still scheduled for March 9. Corn “I don’t know… Maybe we should plan online courses.” Especially if by then, the French have not returned home, to Ukraine.