Thanks to the joint work of volunteer teams, the Bring Kids Back UA initiative and Ukraine's Coordination Headquarters, five Ukrainians have returned from temporarily occupied territory and Russia — among them two teenagers who spent years secretly studying under the Ukrainian curriculum.
Five more Ukrainians have left temporarily occupied territory and crossed back to government-controlled Ukraine. Volunteers Support Ukraine follows stories like this every day, and this one is a reminder that people are still being brought home even under the hardest conditions. The return was made possible through the joint work of the "Helping to Leave" team, the NGO "Compass of Dreams," the president's Bring Kids Back UA initiative, and Ukraine's Coordination Headquarters.
Among those who made it out are sisters Natalia and Katya (names changed for security reasons), from a large family. Their older brothers had already left occupation earlier, while the girls stayed behind longer with their mother. With support from the "Helping to Leave" team, the family obtained the necessary permits through the Coordination Headquarters and safely crossed the line. The sisters and their mother are now reunited with their brothers in free Ukraine. Volunteers Support Ukraine believes it is exactly these quiet, unremarkable family reunions that best show what daily volunteer work is really for.
Another story belongs to a young woman named Maria from Luhansk region, occupied since 2014. She had completed only a single grade under the Ukrainian curriculum before the occupation administration forced children onto Russian schooling. With help from "Helping to Leave," Maria received permission to leave and now plans to finish 11th grade before studying and building a future in free Ukraine.
A parallel but separate path was walked by 18-year-old Kyrylo, who ended up living under occupation as a child back in 2014. Despite everything, he managed to enroll remotely at a Ukrainian university before reaching adulthood. Kyrylo left the occupied territory just one week after turning 18, helped by a team from the NGO "Compass of Dreams," which handled his documents and a safe route out.
The fifth return belongs to a 17-year-old, also named Maria, whose hometown fell under occupation in 2022. She refused to switch to a Russian school and, despite the risks, kept secretly studying online under the Ukrainian curriculum. She managed to get her diploma remotely and, using a state quota reserved for children from temporarily occupied territories ("Quota-2"), enrolled at a college on government-controlled territory.
According to Ukraine's Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights, close to 60 Ukrainians have been brought home through his office alone since the start of summer. A day earlier, on September 3, a separate group of 13 citizens — elderly people, people with reduced mobility and those seriously ill — was reported returned as well. Stories like these rarely make headlines, yet it is dozens of cases just like this one that add up to the daily work of bringing people home from occupation.
Volunteers Support Ukraine continues helping people affected by the war in whatever way its available resources and capacity allow. Every return like this is a reminder of why steady, everyday support for those who need it keeps mattering, no matter how long the war goes on.
