Attempting to Settle in Europe, Moroccan Students in Ukraine Refuse to Return to Morocco

While a large number of Moroccan students are holding their breath inside Ukraine, or at the borders of its neighboring countries, waiting for a plane to take them home to safely join their families, other Moroccan students decided to stay in different European countries, including Germany, Romania, and Austria.

The Moroccan student K.M who made the “no return” choice told the Moroccan newspaper Hespress that, although he knows that his settlement in Europe would be illegal, he still expects that his life conditions would be better there. He simply cannot return without a diploma and after having paid hundreds of euros to afford the university tuition fees, he added.

About 9,000 Moroccan students are studying in Ukraine, according to a previous statement by the Kyiv ambassador to Morocco, Oksana Vasilieva.

Up to March 3, Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita announced, during a government session, the departure of 5,000 Moroccan nationals from Ukraine, since the start of the Russian military operation.

The Moroccan Flight company Royal Air Maroc said that about 2,200 Moroccans residing in Ukraine have returned home between March 2 and 8.

 

Facing the Unknown

K.M journey along with his Moroccan friends who preferred to face the unknown in European countries started from Odessa in Ukraine, where they were pursuing their studies and working at the same time to pay the tuition fees.

When the war broke out in Ukraine, K.M and his Moroccan friends decided to head to the Romanian border, where they got assistance and “best treatment,” the Moroccan students reported. The authorities, civic organizations, and the Ukrainian people gave them food, housing, clothing, and even some money to help them continue their escape journey.

After two days on Romanian territory, they headed to Hungary via train, and there they encountered some difficulties at the border with the police, where they remained stuck for a while in order to answer inquiries and investigate the Hungarian authorities, and then headed to Austria, and then easily entered Germany.

“It is never easy to stay illegally in a country with insufficient material resources, and with the absence of friends or family members who can help you,” K.M explained. However, he stressed that he will not be discouraged, because returning is the worst option for him. He is forced to survive there until a suitable solution is found.

The student explained the reasons why he definitely refuses to return. He disclosed that he obtained a bachelor’s degree in Morocco before traveling to Ukraine. He said that his degree in applied mathematics did not enable him to enter the labor market, and he was unable to follow up his studies in order to enhance his chances of finding a job that may allow him to establish a family. In addition, he stated that his father is retired with an income that does not exceed 160$ per month.

 

Asylum Seeking Option

The high number of Moroccans on the territory of Ukraine’s neighboring countries who do not have the desire to return to their homeland raises the question of “their right to seek asylum.”

The expert on political science Zouhair Attouf stated: “Legally, Moroccan students do not have the right to apply for Asylum in Europe. Because the most important conditions for a person to be eligible for asylum rights is to be from a country whose security and safety is threatened, and this is not the case of Morocco.”

He added: “The situation of Moroccans fleeing Ukraine towards European countries can only be legal if the European countries decide to adopt a supportive strategy toward the residents of Ukraine holding residency cards, namely students. Otherwise, they will be considered illegal immigrants, and the receiving country will have the right to deport them.”

He explained: “For now, under the current war conditions, deporting foreign immigrants fleeing Ukraine is not a priority for European countries, but if the number of arrivals increased and the cost of receiving them increases as well, the authorities of this European country might have to deport foreigners, to relieve the financial and administrative pressure that would fall.”

 

Integrating the Moroccan Education System

The Moroccan authorities announced their intention to enable Moroccan students who returned from Ukraine to complete their university studies in the kingdom's universities.

This was stated by the Minister of Higher Education, Scientific Research and Innovation, Abdellatif Miraoui, in a statement to the Moroccan newspaper Le360.

Miraoui said that his ministry will study the files of returning students "to facilitate the completion of their studies in all Moroccan universities in all disciplines."

He added that his ministry will not abandon these students, it will work hard to help them complete their academic studies.

The minister emphasized that his ministry had contacted several countries neighboring Ukraine in order to enable students who were unable to return to Morocco to complete their studies at these universities.

In the same context, the Ministry of Higher Education announced that it had created an electronic platform to enable the ministry to gather exact information about the students returning from Ukraine to monitor their specializations and university levels.

The ministry called on the concerned students to register their data on the electronic platform.

 

European Universities

Until now, Moroccan students returning from Ukraine still do not know the fate of their studies, amid various efforts to find solutions for them.

Mohamed Elias Benfadil, director of an office for Moroccan students in Ukraine, said that all Ukrainian universities have declared the current period an exceptional holiday for emergency conditions, and therefore all students are legally in a holiday situation.

Benfadil confirmed that he is holding meetings with university officials to try to find solutions for students, so as not to waste their years of studies, stressing that some European universities have talked about the possibility of accepting Moroccan students who have a Ukrainian residency card.

The same spokesperson continued: "The problem is how will these students obtain their official documents from Ukrainian universities," noting that "registration in European universities depends on these documents."