The way we talk, or more accurately, we do not talk about Russian migrants reflects another reality: the lack of help dedicated to them. We met a Russian migrant who decided to come to France in 2020 for her studies. Part of the reasons why she left was she did not agree with the political choices made in Russia. When the war began, the way she was treated here has partially changed. She was even told: “you better not say your nationality for now on, it’s just for your own safety”. That means that there is no juridical status guaranteeing her security. In her opinion, if Ukrainians and Russians are perceived differently it is “because of the two different positions that they have in this war: one is the aggressor and the other one is protecting their lands”. These differences of treatment show the unequal migration policies present in Europe. In fact, European countries treat migrants according to the country where they come from, and not according to the reason why they escape from it.
Even if they are not portrayed as much as Ukrainians are in the media, Russian people fleeing their country share the same motivation. At least 200 000 of them chose to escape rather than remain silent. In fact, Russia does not allow its citizen to speak about the conflict. Or, as our Russian interviewee told us: “we cannot call it a war, or we risk 3 years of imprisonment”. Because Russian migrants lack media representation, Europeans find it difficult to understand why they chose to escape.
Russian migrants mostly belong to the middle class, are highly educated and are young. Because their political opposition was impossible to express and above all impossible to assume due to repression, they left. But this anti-war movement is not so united in exile, and suffers from major differences existing between opponents. In a perfect future, Russian migrants would like to make their homeland more democratic, based on what they experienced abroad. However, they truly fear their trip back.
So how does it work in Europe when you are a Russian refugee? First difficulty is finding information via official government websites. They all highlight measures for Ukrainian people, leaving Russians out. To be even more precise, we met a student who worked in a French prefecture: she told us how it really works from the inside. The department she worked for was in charge of crises. To get the displaced person status, a piece of Ukrainian identification was needed. So Russian escaping the same war, and being “displaced people” too, were not eligible to get it. As she told us, she had the impression that they knew about the situation of Russian migrants but since they did not know how to deal with them, they did not prepare any specific provisions for them, as no one thought Russians would flee too.
The unique type of help Russians can find is online on a website called Map of Peace, which allows them to find exiled anti-war Russian communities. The website also offers the possibility to give money to Russians depending on the country they are in. This shows that unless the civil society acts, Russians are not actually helped by governments.
It is clear that the way European countries treat Russian immigrants is radically opposed to the warm welcome reserved for Ukrainian ones. This could be explained by the way Russians are considered by other European people. In fact, them being seen as aggressors, because living in the country that started this war, keeps them from being helped. Russians are not seen as victims of this conflict, so they are not seen as legitimate to be welcomed as so. They do not feel safe concerning the future of their country, as our Russian interviewee told us: “the worst is yet to come”.
by Pauline Royer and Justine Eyraud
If you want to know more about this issue and have a french point of view, click here !
To go further, on our February file dedicated to the first anniversary of the war in Ukraine, you can read our Society and Culture sections' articles on our blog.
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