Checkpoint in no man's land offers respite for mothers fleeing the terror of bomb attacks

THE queue was three hours long. A logjam of cars, bumper to bumper, packed with women and children who had fled Ukraine into Moldova or Romania waiting to enter the Schengen area at Csengersima on the Romanian-Hungarian border.

- David Cohen

The refugees looked shattered after travelling for days, but as a man in a red jacket approached on foot, eyes lit up, windows rolled down and hands reached out.

The red jacket belonged to Peter Turi, 37, a Hungarian Red Cross volunteer, who carried a tray laden with water, juice, ham sandwiches, snacks and energy bars as well as baby products and bubbles which he offered to grateful mothers and children in their cars.

Peter and his Red Cross team of four were the only charity workers operating at this border crossing which, in the first weeks of the conflict, had filled with cars stretching 10 kilometres all the way to Satu Mare in Romania. For one day I was to be Peter’s helper, crossing the checkpoint into no-man’s land to offer succour to waiting refugees.

“Thank you for your care,” said Marja Nesterova, a professor from a university in Kyiv travelling with her four children, aged 19, 16, 12 and eight. “We have been going for four days and now we are waiting here hours with no water, no toilet, no café, so we really appreciate you being here.”

She added: “In Kyiv, we were sleeping mostly in the basement, but in the last week, the bombs got closer and louder — and we got frightened. According to Ukrainian law, a mother who drives across bombed-out country with four kids can be awarded Mother of the Year. I saved my children. We are going to Italy.”

In the adjacent lane, Natalia, 31, a pharmacist, sat in her Porsche alongside her 10-year-old son, tears streaking down her cheeks as she became emotional about the husband she left in Kharkiv three days ago. She said: “My son is worried about his father. I try to comfort him, but I am worried too.”