As warnings mount that a Russian invasion could happen at any moment, airlines have suspended flights to Ukraine, diplomats have begun to depart and countries around the world have urged their citizens to leave.
But many foreigners in Ukraine have not rushed to get out.
“I am not going anywhere,” said Thomas Jones, a British national who moved to Ukraine seven years ago to help a nongovernmental organization distribute food and medical supplies after Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea. He is now married to a Ukrainian woman and works as an English teacher, writer and translator.
Lamenting a “media frenzy of panic” by Western broadcasters over the current crisis, he said that Ukrainians have lived with the constant threat of Russia and Russian-backed separatists since 2014 and were now used to it, prepared and relatively calm.
“It’s not like people are running to the shops and buying a container load of toilet paper and canned food,” he said.
His view echoed that of many foreigners in Ukraine who in recent weeks have been pulled between warnings from Western governments and urging from the Ukrainian government not to panic.
Following weeks of frantic diplomatic talks that seemed to bear little success, more than a dozen countries — including the United States, Australia, Britain, Italy, Israel and Kuwait — have asked their citizens to leave the country because of safety concerns.
France has taken a different tack, however, saying on Sunday that it was not advising the estimated 1,000 French nationals living in Ukraine to leave. The French ambassador to Kyiv said in a statement that the two nations should not postpone important economic projects.
Ukrainska Pravda, a Ukrainian news outlet, reported on Sunday that an unusually high number of private and chartered jets were departing Kyiv, a possible sign that the country’s elite was packing up.
But for many foreigners, their reluctance to leave Ukraine was rooted in financial concerns. Roberto Marcuccio, who lives in Mykolaiv, in southern Ukraine, said he left everything in his native Italy behind five years ago to make a new life there. He is married to a Ukrainian woman, works for his wife’s billboard business and has a 5-year-old son.
“What am I going to do in Italy? I have no family who can help me, what am I going to eat, how I am going to live?” said Mr. Marcuccio, 48. “I am only going to leave when they start shooting,” he added.
The State Department said that about 6,600 Americans were residing in Ukraine as of October, but that the total number of U.S. nationals in the country could be as high as 16,000, including tourists and visitors.
John Jones, a 63-year-old Californian who owns a solar panel manufacturer in Ukraine was determined to stay in Kyiv, unwilling to turn his back on colleagues and friends.
“You can’t leave a business unattended,” he said, “and I wouldn’t leave if all my people didn’t also leave.”
