Ukraine: Vulnerability & Opportunity
By Lauren Medlicott:
If you’re like me, you’ve been keeping track of the atrocities that are happening in Ukraine. It’s hard to avoid the constant news coverage of men fighting, desperate to protect their homeland. Women and children hiding in underground transport stations. Throngs of people attempting to get out of their beloved country before Russian forces take their innocent lives. Maybe you want to turn off the TV or stop reading the breaking news. Your emotions just can’t handle it anymore. And that’s completely understandable. But in your attempt to protect your own well-being, perhaps consider that the darkness of war continues to rage on, not just in Ukraine, but all around the world, even as you close your eyes. It’s still happening. It’s still someone else’s reality.
As Red Community, it’s worth us remembering how conflict and war often make people more vulnerable to human trafficking and modern slavery.
Imagine a family who looks out their window every morning, aware that this could be the day a bomb blasts their home or armed soldiers break down their door. They have to get out – their lives depend on it. The father stays to fight and defend. The mother gathers their children and the escape begins. They have nothing. Nothing, except the bags on their backs. In a matter of hours, they have lost everything – jobs, home, food, peace, people. Lives completely changed by war and displacement.
Globally, women and girls make up around half of displaced people, but recently as seen in Syria and Ukraine, women are disproportionately represented when it comes to those forced to flee due to war and conflict.
Let’s go back to that family we were imagining. While that mother is strong – courageously protecting herself and her children no matter the cost – she is also very vulnerable. Having nothing, she must make sacrifices to survive. She may have to catch a lift with a truck driver she doesn’t know. She may have to stay in a house she’s never visited. She may have to perform services for documents. She may have to work for free for a bite to eat.
Exploitation, abuse, and trafficking are all real concerns, especially for women and children, during war. Particularly at border crossings and receptions centres.
Can anything be done?
If vulnerability and lack of choice are contributing factors that lead to exploitation, then what is needed is coordinated efforts from protections services to accompany and register those fleeing from conflict, and plenty of necessities for survival. With legal protection, correct papers, cash, shelter, food, and awareness of their options and rights, refugees fleeing conflict will be at less risk of exploitation.
It’s simple really. Give refugees what they need, and the risk of trafficking will be massively reduced. Displaced people have faced enough trauma – the least that the international community can do is to make it as safe as possible to escape and settle elsewhere. We can send money, hold our government responsible for the way they welcome refugees, open our homes, and raise our voices in social circles on behalf of people impacted by war.
This is a chance that we get to show Jesus’ heart of love to men, women and children undergoing violence. Jesus loved peace. His kingdom will one day be full of it. But until then, we can be the peace that war has disrupted.
If you’re interested to hear more about how you can help, feel free to send me an email (lauren@redcommunity.co.uk) and I can try to direct you to people on the front lines helping.