Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainian refugees flee war

[GENEVA] Nearly 4.2 million Ukrainians have fled their country since Russia's invasion began on Feb 24, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the past 24 hours, UN numbers show.

The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, said on Sunday (Apr 3) that 4,176,401 Ukrainians had fled in just over 5 weeks, up 38,559 from the figure given a day earlier.

Women and children account for 90 per cent of those who have left Ukraine, with men aged 18 to 60 eligible for military call-up and unable to leave.

The UN's International Organization for Migration (IOM) said that in addition to Ukrainian refugees, nearly 205,500 non-Ukrainians living, studying or working in the country have also left.

Nearly 6.48 million people were meanwhile estimated to be internally displaced within Ukraine as at mid-March, according IOM.

That puts the total number of people displaced by the conflict at well over 10 million, or around a quarter of Ukraine's total population.

Before the Russian invasion, Ukraine had a population of 37 million in the regions under government control, excluding Russia-annexed Crimea and the pro-Russian separatist regions in the east.

Children have been disproportionately affected. The UN children's agency Unicef said in late March that more than half of the country's estimated 7.5 million children had been displaced - 2.5 million internally and two million abroad. AFP