‘My goal was just not to die' - Ukrainian refugees flee to Hungary as Russia's war worsens

On the third day of the war, the bombing became overbearing, and Vera Rudova concluded it was time to leave Kyiv, the city where she had lived her entire life. “It was my last chance to get out,” she says.

- BORZOU DARAGAHI

The 31-year-old Ukrainian stylist boarded what she says was the final train out of Kyiv and made her way from station to station in the vast Ukrainian countryside, squeezing her way onto trains first toward Lviv and the Polish border, and then towards the Hungarian frontier before she finally arrived in Budapest yesterday afternoon.

“My goal was just not to die and be safe,” she tells The Independent, as she rested outside Budapest’s Nyugati station, which has turned into a makeshift humanitarian relief hub for thousands of Ukrainians and others escaping Russia’s invasion.

The ornate train station, built in the 19th century by the same company that built the Eiffel Tower in Paris and considered an architectural masterpiece, is now the centre of efforts by Hungarian authorities, relief organisations and good samaritans to help at least 80,000 Ukrainian citizens and residents who have fled the conflict.

The government of the controversial prime minister Viktor Orban, who has frequently demonised migrants and refugees from the Middle East, has thrown open its doors to those escaping the Ukraine war and set up a national helpline to coordinate efforts and direct aid – earning praise even from opponents.