MOSCOW, August 14 (RIA Novosti) -Almost 17,000 children from southeastern Ukraine are staying in temporary accommodation settlements in Russia, the Russian Ministry of Civil Defense, Emergencies and Disaster Relief (EMERCOM) said Thursday.
“As of today, 740 temporary settlements are allocated, accommodating 51,390 people including 16,690 children,” EMERCOM representative Alexander Drobyshevsky told RIA Novosti. He added that all the refugees are being provided with food, health and psychological care and any information they might require.
The settlements are usually located in health care, educational and recreational facilities, as well as children’s summer camps with beds numbering from 50 to several thousand, although sometimes refugees are accommodated in passenger railway cars.
The influx of Ukrainian refugees to Russia has significantly increased since June due to a conflict between Donbas independence supporters and Ukrainian forces. According to the United Nations, the number of people who have fled Ukraine for Russia since the beginning of 2014 is about 730,000.
