As the Second Largest Community in Ukraine, How Did the Crisis Affect Moroccan Students?

Sara Andalousi | 3 years ago

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With the increasing escalation between Russia and Ukraine following the launch of joint exercises between the Russian and Belarusian army in the north of the country, the fear of an upcoming Russian invasion of Ukraine has grown dramatically. Moroccan students as the second-largest foreign students in Ukraine are under intensive state of doubt and fear.

Western governments called their citizens to leave Ukraine. The United States, Canada, and Australia have emptied their embassies of staff and suspended work in them. Both the Moroccan and Algerian Foreign Ministry asked their nationals in Ukraine to leave the country.

On Saturday, February 12, 2022, the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement: "In light of the current situation, the Embassy of the Kingdom of Morocco in Kyiv recommends that Moroccan citizens in Ukraine leave it for the sake of their safety, through the available commercial flights."

The Moroccan embassy in Kyiv also called on Moroccan citizens wishing to travel to Ukraine to postpone their travel for the time being.

However, the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stressed that "everything is under control," calling to stop the spread of fear atmosphere after the United States warned of a possible close Russian aggression, a possibility he did not confirm.

 

Within Days

US Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters on 20 February, that Russia's possible invasion of Ukraine within days is strong.

Although Russia has repeatedly stated that it does not intend to attack Ukraine, Bloomberg News Agency quoted Harris as saying, "Putin made his decision."

These statements came before Harris’s return to the United States, after two days of high-level meetings, at the Munich Security Conference.

US President Joe Biden confirmed, on February 18, that Russia intends to attack Ukraine in the coming days. Biden said Russia was trying to create a "false justification" for war with Ukraine. He added: "We are ready to impose severe sanctions if Russia invades Ukraine. We will not take part in the fighting, but we will continue to support the Ukrainian people."

Soumia, a Moroccan student at Kyiv Medical University, said in an interview with Al-Estiklal: “I decided to stay in Ukraine and continue my studies. At least for now, I don’t think about leaving the country. The university courses are instructed normally, the everyday routine activities are all normal. Although the fears prevail, life is taking its normal course. We are afraid of what may happen, but we hope that the war won’t start because it benefits no one. Everyone will lose because of the war. I believe that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would be soft control of power but not a military destructive war.”

The Moroccan students also stressed that: “Returning to Morocco is not easy, because of the expensive ticket prices and the possibility of having troubles with our universities. Furthermore, we are also facing problems with the health measures imposed by the Moroccan authorities to confront the outbreak of the Coronavirus. In order to fly to Morocco, it is necessary to have taken three doses of the vaccine and get a negative PCR to prove that we are not infected by the virus.”

 

Conditional Leave

A group of Ukrainian universities agreed to allow the return of Moroccan students to their country in the coming days, but they stipulated that they must pay all tuition fees in order to benefit from the distance education that will be adopted over the coming weeks.

According to the testimonies of some students, many Ukrainian universities have allowed Moroccan students who have paid all tuition fees to return to Morocco, on the basis that the distance education will start in a few days, while negotiations are still ongoing between those universities and the students who pay the fees in consecutive installments throughout the year.

For instance, the universities of Dnipro and Odesa agreed on the distance education model for the benefit of students, while other universities are still holding technical meetings.

Students organized protests in several universities to pressure the administrative staff to interact positively with the Moroccan embassy's communication in Kyiv.

The Moroccan diplomatic authorities in Kyiv, according to the testimonies of many students, intervened in the current crisis by building bridges of communication with Ukrainian universities, as well as with the Ministry of Education in order to mediate in the file so that there would not be any administrative problems for students.

 

Soaring Ticket Prices

The return option is strenuous for Moroccan students due to many reasons. First, making the decision to leave the country entails affording the flight price and finding suitable trips for students who depend mainly on their families to secure their living.

In an interview with TRT Arabic, Hassan al-Karmawi, a Moroccan student in Ukraine, complained: "We cannot find suitable return tickets, the supply is very limited compared to the great demand after the warnings of the Moroccan embassy in Kyiv. Even when the student succeeds in securing one, the price is extremely expensive."

Hassan added: "Many of the students who couldn’t afford those astronomical prices traveled to the west of the country, away from the areas threatened by the invasion, waiting to be provided with direct evacuation flights."

Moroccan students are struggling to obtain return tickets to Morocco, as the agencies of Royal Air Maroc and Air Arabia are witnessing a massive turnout from the community residing in Ukraine, with exceptional flights allocated for evacuation.

Many other Arab students are stuck in the same boat, typically the Algerian students. The Algerian journalist Mouloud Sayyad, revealed that: "We can understand from the interaction of the Algerian embassy and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs with the expatriates in Ukraine that the Algerian authority preferred to wait instead of demanding their departure."

However, he expressed his concern about this matter, by emphasizing that no one knows when the war will start. He stressed: “I am afraid that the students and Algerian citizens in Ukraine will be harmed. It is safer to conduct direct evacuation flights from now, without having to do so if the war broke out because it could be late."

 

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