[The Epoch Times, March 6, 2022](The Epoch Times reporter Li Yun comprehensive report) Russia invaded Ukraine, and the CCP’s slow evacuation of overseas Chinese has put Chinese citizens and students in danger. Some US media said that Chinese students are exposed to avoidable security risks.
The Voice of America reported on the 5th that because the Chinese authorities have been slower than many countries in evacuating Chinese nationals, Chinese students and Chinese citizens in Ukraine are exposed to security risks that may have been avoided.
Reports say that Ukraine’s second largest city, Kharkiv, has been bombed by Russian troops for days. On the evening of the 3rd, Ukrainian media said that several students of the Kharkov Cultural Institute in Ukraine were killed by the Russian military bombing, including four Chinese students. The news was refuted by the Chinese Communist Party’s official media, calling it “fake news”.
However, in the WeChat group of Chinese students in Ukraine, this news is considered to be true news, and some people say: “I must go back to China, four people have been beaten to death.”
China confirmed on the 2nd that a Chinese citizen was injured in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. A Chinese student posted a video saying, “As we were leaving, seven or eight armored tanks from the Russian army came out and shot us. One person was shot.”
In Sumy, in the northeastern region of Ukraine, more than 100 Chinese students were trapped in local bomb shelters, facing food shortages.
They posted that the nearby train stations, bridges, etc. had already been bombed by the Russian army, and waiting for the embassy to rescue was the only solution. “I feel more and more desperate, and I don’t know when I can leave the war-torn country.”
They posted on Weibo, hoping to get a response from the relevant authorities, and their posts were deleted and their accounts closed.
Chinese embassy slow to evacuate citizens
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on February 21 that he recognized the independence of the Ukrainian and Eastern regions, and on the 24th began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. At a time when democracies around the world condemned and sanctioned Russia, the CCP’s attitude was ambiguous, and the mainland’s official media and Little Pink even more one-sidedly supported Russia’s invasion.
Before the outbreak of the Ukrainian-Russian war, many countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States closed their embassies in Ukraine and urged their citizens to leave Ukraine as soon as possible, but the CCP has not issued relevant reminders to Chinese citizens in Ukraine.
After the Ukrainian-Russian war, the Chinese embassy in Uzbekistan initially only called on the Chinese to affix the blood flag of the Chinese Communist Party to ensure safety, but later changed its tune and said that the Chinese “don’t reveal their identities at will.”
After the emergency evacuation of overseas Chinese all over the world, the Chinese embassy issued a notice to “start the charter flight to evacuate overseas Chinese”. However, the “evacuation plan” was cancelled on February 27, on the grounds that the situation of the Russian-Ukrainian war was escalating and the official encountered “practical difficulties”.
Chinese embassy asks students to flee on their own
With the use of heavy artillery by the Russian army, several cities in Ukraine were bombed. The CCP announced on March 1 that it would start the evacuation of overseas Chinese by bus. However, Chinese students disclosed online that the Chinese embassy could not provide help at all.
A Chinese female student posted a recording of herself asking the Chinese embassy for help, but the other party suggested to evacuate by herself. If you cannot evacuate by yourself, prepare food and water for two weeks. The student expressed fear and kept crying, but the embassy staff just said: “I’m an adult, I can do it if I can.”
Under the pressure of public opinion, the Chinese embassy issued a notice on March 2 that at 12:00 noon that day, people who voluntarily evacuated from Kyiv and its surrounding areas would gather at the terminal of the urban subway blue line, and then take the bus to Moldova. Self-driving personnel can accompany them.
Wang Jixian, a Beijing-based programmer stranded in Ukraine, posted a video saying that the war was raging and traffic was disrupted, so they could not go to Kyiv to assemble and were forced to stay. He had also sought asylum at the embassy, who told him to stay at home.
Evacuated Chinese citizens still encounter difficulties
At the regular press conference of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Communist Party of China on March 3, Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said that more than 3,000 Chinese citizens have been evacuated from Ukraine. However, according to Chinese statistics, there are at least 6,000 Chinese citizens in Ukraine.
A Chinese student said to Lu Media on the 3rd, “What I have learned is that hundreds of people were evacuated from Odessa, and the first batch of international students from Kyiv evacuated hundreds of people… My classmates and I stayed here, and we received a notice that , if you can find a way to get on the train, you can evacuate by yourself.”
The CCP media said that on the morning of the 5th, China’s first flight to evacuate overseas Chinese arrived in Hangzhou, Zhejiang from the Romanian capital, and another flight arrived in Zhengzhou, Henan a few hours later. The two flights carried about 480 people.
However, a “petition” signed “All Chinese compatriots evacuated from Ukraine to Romania” to the leaders of the Chinese embassies abroad wrote that they received a notice on the afternoon of the 3rd that they would be responsible for their own flight tickets and quarantine hotel expenses. The air ticket is 17,999 yuan, and the cost of isolation is not yet clear.
The “petition” said that the air ticket price offered by Air China made them unacceptable. They evacuated from Ukraine all the way through hardships and hardships. Many people simply did not have time to prepare sufficient funds, and some people simply could not afford the ticket price.
Compared with China, the Indian government sent four largest transport planes after the war between Russia and Ukraine to evacuate overseas Chinese free of charge around the clock. As of the 2nd, more than 12,000 Indians have left Ukraine.
Responsible editor: Sun Yun#