Sexual Predators Unleash Online Hunt For Female Ukrainian Refugees to UK, Claims Undercover Journo
15:31 GMT 10.04.2022 (Updated: 15:18 GMT 28.05.2023)
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As Ukrainian women seek to enter Britain while fleeing the ongoing conflict in their home country under the government Homes for Ukraine scheme, UK hosts must link up with refugees themselves. Accordingly, tens of thousands of people are being forced to resort to unregulated Facebook groups to solve accommodation issues.
Female Ukrainian refugees hoping to flee to the UK seeking a better life are being hunted by sexual predators, revealed an investigation by The Times.
Women posting messages in special Facebook* groups, such as UK Accommodation for Ukrainian refugees, which has 50,000 members, have encountered a barrage of inappropriate, sexually explicit messages from men, discovered an undercover reporter.
Those who want to move to the UK are required to have a sponsor before applying for a visa. While a government-organised “matching” service run by Reset charity operates to bring together British hosts and arriving refugees, it is only in its early stages, with many resorting to Facebook groups.
Posing as Natalya, 22, from Kiev, the journalist said many answers to requests of sponsorship suggested sharing a bed.
In other instances the men lied about having several bedrooms in their one-bed homes. Some messages were more veiled, hinting, “I am ready to help you and maybe you can help me also.”
Once the reporter had posted one of her messages online, a man whose profile photograph is a tattooed torso, responded, just minutes later, quipping, “Are you single?”
The 47-year-old is described as having repeatedly proposed: “I [will] marry with you."
He went on to say that if he became “Natalya’s sponsor”, he would sleep on the sofa in his one-bed flat, while she could occupy his bedroom.
“I sleep on sofa… Don’t worry. I am not [a] sex maniac. I am not that kind of m[a]n,” he wrote.
Another man proposed that a Ukrainian refugee would pretend he was an “immediate family member” of hers.
“For example as your unmarried partner. Just for pretending, so I can sort my immigration status,” he said, adding he could “pay £3,000” and help “with sponsor[ship] or anything else in England.”
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© Sputnik / Ramil Sitdikov
Over a course of just two days, 41 of the 75 private messages sent to “Natalya” appeared to come from single men who lived alone.
The undercover reporter was also messaged by a 43-year-old chef in London who could only offer a “small space” close to central London, sending pictures of the home showing his studio flat. However, he specifically failed to show the proposed bedroom for the refugee.
It was only after the reported pressed him further regarding where she would sleep that he suggested they could share a bed.
“I have a large bed. We could sleep together,” he wrote.
When “Natalya” asked, “What if I never want to be physical?” the man replied that he was not offering sponsorship to a person unwilling to have sex, but intimate relations would be “with the consent of both”. He also insisted he had “passed all the safe checks” for “matching up” membership, carried out by the volunteer administrators of Facebook groups.
According to specific government guidance, anyone who applies to be a sponsor for a refugee has to pass a Police National Computer check. Disclosure and Barring Service checks on adult hosts are required after the refugee is paired with a sponsor host.
In response to the report, Louise Calvey, the head of services and safeguarding at Refugee Action,was cited as saying:
“What we have is a government-run scheme that is leaving women at risk of sexual exploitation.”
Refugee Action already voiced concerns that local councils, instructed to make an in-person check on sponsor homes before a refugee arrives “wherever possible”, are failing to comply in many instances.
“Criminal record checks do not pick up sexual predators who have no criminal record, allowing them to register and pass checks to sponsor a refugee in their home,” Calvey said, warning:
“If the scheme continues in this manner we have no doubt that some refugees may be placed into very dangerous situations by the Homes for Ukraine scheme.”
The report comes as a stream of refugees from Ukraine has been heading to the EU countries, including the UK, after Russia responded to a request for assistance from the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR) amid escalating attacks on the Donbass region by Kiev authorities.
Moscow began its military operation on 24 February to "demilitarise and de-Nazify" Ukraine, underscoring that it had no plans to occupy the country, with the operation exclusively targeting Kiev’s military infrastructure.
Passengers queue to check in, at Heathrow Airport in London, Monday, Nov. 29, 2021.
© AP Photo / Frank Augstein
More than 4.5 million refugees have since left Ukraine (as of 9 April 2022), with many not necessarily fleeing areas of immediate military operations, as they hope to avail themselves of an opportunity to start a new life abroad.
However, legal advice organisation say that people have been forced to return to Ukraine because of protracted delays in securing UK visas under the government’s two schemes – a family process and sponsorship programme.
*Meta (Facebook and Instagram) is banned in Russia over extremist activities.
