The International Organization of Migration (IOM) this week expressed alarm over the discrimination and racism which third country nationals have been subjected to as they attempt to leave conflict-torn areas of Ukraine.
"People are fleeing a war but still find time to be racist," said Haddy Gassama, national director of Policy and Advocacy for UndocuBlack. "It’s so unfortunate, so disappointing but Black people tend to bear the brunt of cruelty."
Last month, the UndocuBlack Network in a statement expressed solidarity with migrants fleeing Ukraine who faced anti-Black discrimination within the interior of the country and ports of entry into neighboring Poland.
Gassama said she has heard that it is not Polish border guards but Ukrainian border patrols doing this. However, Gassama said non-white colleagues are not on board with her in condemning the racism.
"Anytime it comes to Black people’s struggle and trauma, we have to prove ourselves," she added.
Pastor of Victory in Praise Church in Stockton, California, Trena Turner, said Americans cannot have a narrow view of the situation in Ukraine.
"We can’t just be myopic about what’s going on here. We have to avoid distractions and turn this into a fight of Black bodies globally," Turner said.
According to the UN, the number of refugees who have fled Ukraine since Russia began its military operation in the country last week has reached one million.
A number of foreign students and residents have spoken to journalists and recorded video footage of being turned away from buses and trains and forced to allow white Ukrainians to go ahead of them in line.
Ukraine Border Guard Service spokesman, Andriy Demchenko, told CNN the allegations of segregation at the borders are untrue. The guards, he added, are working under enormous pressure but within the law.