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    Almost 100,000 young men flee Ukraine in two months
    Poland

    Almost 100,000 young men flee Ukraine in two months

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    1. Themetalin on

      Almost 100,000 fighting-age Ukrainian men have left the country in the past two months after Volodymyr Zelensky eased departure rules, new figures show.

      Poland’s border guard said 99,000 Ukrainian men aged between 18 and 22 had crossed the frontier – the primary route out of the country – since regulations to ensure that Kyiv had enough soldiers were relaxed at the end of August.

      American generals and politicians had complained that Mr Zelensky’s refusal to draft any men of fighting age was hurting Ukraine’s hopes of resisting Russia’s invasion or pressing home advantages.

      This fear has been echoed among European officials, who are concerned that Kyiv has not done enough to plug manpower shortages.

      Some 45,300 Ukrainian men aged between 18 and 22 entered Poland from January to just before the rule change at the end of August, according to Poland’s border guards. In the next two months, that number more than doubled to 98,500, or 1,600 a day.

      The rising number of Ukrainians will pile pressure on Mr Merz to cut support for refugees from the war-torn country sheltering in Germany.

      Jurgen Hardt, the Right-wing CDU party’s foreign affairs foreign policy chief, told Politico: “We have no interest in young Ukrainian men spending their time in Germany instead of defending their country. Ukraine makes its own decisions, but the recent change in the law has led to a trend of emigration that we must address.”

    2. phtoa1 on

      I can’t blame them.
      What do they owe to their country?

      A country that by all means is super corrupt and have offered these young men very little opportunity.

      I understand fighting for your family etc, but staying and potentially dying for a country that gave you so little, never.

    6. Temporary-Guidance20 on

      I don’t blame them but this makes situation a bit schizophrenic. What’s the point of all of this if no one wants to defend it. Many Ukrainians are very happy with the invasion. They were able to leave Ukraine and get better life.

    7. Feisty_Area849 on

      Good for them.

      There is nothing to fight for. Even if they somehow won the war, what then? Your country is still a shithole and your women left and married westerners.

    11. HadronLicker on

      Why help them if they’re unwilling to fight for themselves. And don’t give me that “you would do the same if you were in their place” crap.

      Someone has to fight or they’ll eventually run out of soldiers and fall. This is not what the West is helping them out for.

    12. auroriasolaris on

      Nobody have any right to blame them. Nobody needs to die for their country, people just want to live in relative peace.

    14. LazyZeus on

      Fixed it for you: “Almost 100,000 young Ukrainians age 18-22 crossed the border since adoption of the law, that gave them this right during martial law.”

    16. WhatIsATriffid on

      Ukraine has a U shaped demographic problem i.e. young people under 25 are a bottleneck. Ukraine had previously restricted recruiting younger people (I think under 24), the idea being that if you conscript over 30s, they already have kids.

      You need people to fight a war, but its unfair for Ukraine to fight alone. The west has dragged its feet on supplying modern effective weapons, with Biden famously trying to get Zekensky to send its young men to war (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/28/ukraine-war-briefing-us-pressure-on-zelenskyy-to-lower-conscription-age-to-18) i.e. we will forbid you from using long range weapons, send you young men into the meat grinder.

      Poland is next door to this. Ukraine’s survival is our survival. Come join us in Kyiv next week to build better air defenses [https://luma.com/edth-2025-kyiv](https://luma.com/edth-2025-kyiv)

    17. Zealousideal_Sort521 on

      Wow, the war against Russia is doing as great as we are being told in the newspapers!