According to the Norwegian Refugee Council, more than 850 000 people have already been displaced in Ukraine since 2014 because of the fighting in Crimea.
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“We must not underestimate the human suffering that a reignited conflict would cause.” Up to two million people living near the frontline in eastern Ukraine are at risk of being displaced if fighting resumes, the Norwegian Refugee Council warned on Thursday.
“The lives and safety of millions of people in eastern Ukraine hang in the balance as we await a political breakthrough to break this impasse”explained the secretary general of the NGO, Jan Egeland, in a press release (in English). “This would increase the number of civilian casualties, cause mass displacement and cause an increase in humanitarian needs.”
Westerners have accused Russia since the end of 2021 of having massed tens of thousands of soldiers on the Ukrainian border for a military operation against Kiev, which Moscow denies. Eastern Ukraine has already been plagued since 2014 by a war between Kiev and pro-Russian separatists, a conflict that erupted after the annexation of Ukrainian Crimea by Moscow. The war, which has claimed more than 13,000 lives, has fallen sharply in intensity since peace agreements in 2015. According to the Norwegian Refugee Council, more than 850,000 people have already been displaced in Ukraine because of the fighting. An active resumption of the conflict could, according to the NGO, reduce to nothing “significant progress” recent years in the situation of the populations of eastern Ukraine.