Regimes of terror often have a taste for money. Russia is no exception. It is discreetly allowing civilians to leave the part of Ukraine it occupies, taking its share of their journey costs to the free zone. There's nothing humanitarian about this policy. Ukrainians are leaving these territories only in dribs and drabs. For Moscow, it's also a way of getting rid of less docile inhabitants and "Russifying" the conquered regions more quickly.

Petro Alexandrovich is only 62, but he looks 15 years older. With a heavy physical build, shortness of breath and worn clothes, he's starting all over again. He arrived in Kyiv on October 8 from Luhansk in the Donbas after a two-day journey through Belarus. He has no pension, no relatives, or social security, and is living in a UN-sponsored hostel for students and the destitute.

"Here, I'm nobody," the man whose daily life had become impossible in Luhansk said. He said he never hid his pro-Ukrainian sympathies in a city administered by pro-Russian separatists from 2014 and occupied by Moscow troops in February 2022. "Between 2014 and 2022, people put up with this russification. Things changed from 2022 onwards, the Russians' stranglehold worsened and the pressure on those who thought differently became stronger," Alexandrovich recounted, his face brightening as he told his story.

The Russian administration doesn't just use the stick against pro-Ukrainian residents. Alexandrovich's 88-year-old next-door neighbor had been staunchly pro-Ukrainian ever since her apartment building was hit by Russian shells. Then, in 2023, she changed her mind. "The Russians have increased pensions," he explained. "My neighbor suddenly received $350 a month, $250 more than before, and in her eyes, the Russians have become good people. They're buying people."

'I was beaten up'

In 2022, Alexandrovich's life took a turn for the worse. In poor health, he came into conflict with two families in the building, after the construction of a garage that was blocking access to his own. "In June 2022, I was beaten up. The police initially agreed I was in the right, but then let it go when my neighbors said I was pro-Ukrainian. The families filed complaints against me, even my niece and nephew turned their backs on me."

Three months later, he recalled, he was still lying on his sofa, "waiting for death to come," when he found online contact details for the Ukrainian NGO Helping to Leave. This foundation provided him with information and agreed to finance his trip. "Otherwise, I'd have had to pay a transport company between $200 and $250 for the trip," he said, before adding: "My dream now is to find my daughter, who left for the US with my ex-wife 25 years ago. In retrospect, I think I should have left earlier."

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