“We are about to spend the night in the metro”

In Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, the day began with the sound of bombs.“It seemed both far and very close to us”tells franceinfo Pierre Mareczko, a 35-year-old Frenchman who moved to Ukraine in 2019. With his wife Victoria, eight months pregnant, he took refuge, Thursday, February 24 in the afternoon, in a station of metro from the north of the city.

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“I received a call from the Quai d’Orsay, which lists the French in the country for a possible evacuation, but it seemed complicated to me with my wife about to give birth”, explains by telephone the ex-journalist, reconverted in finance. Before descending underground, he considered several options, such as taking the road west. “Too riskyhe ended up deciding, we didn’t know where to go… And if it was to come across fights?

Behind him, a shrill noise interrupts him. This is the M2 line metro, which still operates and runs until 10 p.m. “It’s quite surrealslips Pierre Mareczko. Afterwards, all the lights will go out because we will be placed under curfew until 7 am, as provided for by martial law. We are about to spend the night in the subway.” The station where he is is one of many bomb shelters opened around 4 p.m. Thursday, as a message from Ukraine’s defense minister, Oleksiy Reznikov, was broadcast on local channels.

“We heard that aviation movements had been detected in our area and that it was better to take shelter as soon as possible”, relates Pierre Mareczko. Since then, around 300 people have been waiting in the station, which has been transformed into a base camp, their eyes glued to television screens or glued to their phones. “There are families, children, elderly people, many people who do not have a second home to take refuge in”describes the thirties, who says he is impressed by the calm of his neighbors.

“One might expect scenes of panic, but it’s quite the opposite, he repeats. When my wife felt ill, everyone rallied together to help her. We quickly found a doctor and the babushkas have just brought a deckchair for her to rest.” The babushkas (“grandmothers”, in Russian), it is the employees of the capital’s metro, receptionists, counter clerks… who remain faithful to their position this evening. A reassuring symbol for some refugees, as everyone prepares to sleep on camping chairs and yoga mats, rolled out on the station’s cold black tiles.

For Pierre Mareczko and his family, the night promises to be tough. “We all see images of bombings scrolling through on Telegram, he says, on buildings that often look like those in our neighborhood.” His wife, originally from Luhansk, in the Donbass, had fled the war in 2014 with the pro-Russian separatists. She finds herself caught up in the conflict, and each hour spent in the metro station raises the question of exile a little more.

“Until today there was no question for us to leave, because our life is here, our daughter is about to be born, says Pierre Mareczko, but I have to get my wife to safety. If France is ready to evacuate us, and the situation worsens, we will leave, of course.”