Government failed internally displaced Ukrainians, expert says
Iryna Vereshchuk (Photo: president.gov.ua)
The Ukrainian government has “botched” efforts to take proper care of internally displaced persons (IDPs), focusing too much on refugees abroad, Petro Andriushchenko, head of the Center for the Study of Occupation, told NV Radio on Sept. 25.
Andriushchenko aimed his criticism at Iryna Vereshchuk, who served as the minister for the reintegration of temporarily occupied territories from Nov. 4, 2021, until Sept. 5, 2024. Vereshchuk was then appointed Deputy Head of the President’s Office.
“And then the deputy head of the Office of the President—Iryna Vereshchuk, who has been directly responsible for this since the first evacuation convoys left occupied parts of Donetsk and Zaporizhzhya oblasts— she botched the work from the start,” Andriushchenko said.
“Then she goes to Poland and says, ‘We need to think about people returning from Poland and create [welcoming] conditions for them.”
According to Andriushchenko, Vereshchuk’s comments angered many IDPs, including those from Mariupol. Andriushchenko previously worked in the Mariupol municipal administration.
“I then spoke with our people—not just Mariupol residents—and everyone agreed these remarks [by Vereshchuk] should never have been made on air,” he said.
“We live here, people do their best to remain in Ukraine, and they hope someone will finally look after them. Instead, they hear, ‘We won’t think about you; instead, we’ll think about other Ukrainians whom our Polish brothers might expel from Poland. They’re important to us.’ It’s a disgrace, something that should never happen in a country at war.”
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