Thousands of Chinese nationals remain stranded in Ukraine, nearly four days after the Russian invasion, despite official promises to evacuate them.
The Chinese embassy in Kyiv told Chinese citizens in Ukraine to make preparations to evacuate the country on Friday, warning of a “high security risk,” and calling on them to register with the authorities to take charter flights out of the country.
But by Monday, no more had been heard from officials on the evacuation plan, according volunteer in touch with Chinese nationals in Kyiv.
“As far as I know, there are a lot of them down in subway stations in urban areas,” the volunteer, surnamed Wen, told RFA. “[The evacuation plan] simply wasn’t going to work because so many of the bridges have been blown up.”
“They said they would charter flights, and several of my friends registered, but there has been no next step,” she said.
A Chinese national who escaped across the border to Moldova said many other Chinese nationals are hoping to follow him.
“A lot of Chinese nationals who want to leave Ukraine are contacting me right now,” the man said. “I am telling them how to do it.”
Unconfirmed social media posts said the Chinese ambassador has been evacuated to Russia, alongside employees of China’s Huawei telecoms giant, leaving regular Chinese citizens behind to fend for themselves. State news agency Xinhua published a report on Sunday saying ambassador Fan Rong was still in Ukraine, however.
Nationals of democratic Taiwan had been picked up by cars sent by their embassy and driven all the way to Poland, while group chat participants on WeChat were unable to discuss concrete arrangements for fear of getting their accounts shut down by Chinese censors.
Repeated calls to the Chinese embassy in Ukraine rang unanswered during office hours on Monday, as did calls to to the consulate in Odessa.
Narrative vs. reality
Meanwhile, Chinese nationals trapped in Ukraine have been attacked and harassed by Ukrainians angered by their government’s support for Putin, according to social media reports.
Former Southern Metropolis Daily editor Cheng Yizhong said ties between Beijing and the Kremlin had warmed considerably since CCP leader Xi Jinping took power in 2012.
“Xi Jinping has elevated the relationship with Russia since he came to power … so the Propaganda Department has an overreaching narrative, which is to avoid criticizing Russia,” Cheng told RFA. “It’s all about prioritizing politics, without taking into account that things aren’t the way Putin says they are.”
Any Chinese nationals stuck in Ukrainian cities faces overnight bombing raids and shelling, according to Ukrainian Arthur Kharytonov, a member of the Ukraine-based Free Hong Kong Center, which has campaigned for greater solidarity with Hong Kong amid a national security crackdown on dissent and political opposition under the CCP.
“I’m right now in the very city center of Kyiv because the fight is here,” Kharytonov told RFA. “It’s difficult, very difficult because … Russia is attacking only at night. Last night was very hard. It was a lot of bombing attacks in Kyiv … and a lot of gunfire all around the city.”
“And this night will be the same. So of course, I’m quite scared,” he said. “It’s very terrible to know that you could be killed, right now.”
Kharytonov said he had decided to stay because Kyiv was better defended than most of the county.
“We have no secure place here in Ukraine; every city is under attack,” he said. “So even to travel is quite dangerous.”
He welcomed moves to exclude Russia from SWIFT international payments network.
“Russian money [is] Putin’s money. So if Russia is losing money, Putin loses his money,” Kharytonov said. “We hope that it will provoke huge protests [that] will attack Putin, and to make him stop the war.”
“We just want them to [go] back to Russia, to liberate all our territories, including Crimea and Donbass. And let them leave how they want, but we don’t need them in Ukraine,” he said.
Tasteless jokes cause trouble
The renewed attacks on Ukrainian cities came as Chinese nationals stranded in the country called on Chinese social media commentators to stop joking about getting Ukrainian women as a result of the war, as the popular joke was making them a target of suspicion and hostility among Ukrainians.
“These comments have been translated by the Ukrainian media, so basically everyone knows about it now,” one student said in a video clip circulating on Twitter. “Now, old ladies and young people alike are questioning Chinese students in the bomb shelters in Kyiv [about this].”
“This means a lot of [Chinese] students are afraid to stay in the subway stations [during air raids],” the student said. “I hope you keyboard warriors will keep your words to yourselves so we have a hope of surviving.”
“Some of us are asking us where we’re from, and we say we’re Japanese,” the student said. “Thanks to you guys, we daren’t even say we’re Chinese.”
“You lack morality and a sense of truth; you aren’t even human. So many people have died, and you say that’s a good thing because you can get their women?”
A Ukrainian woman with the nickname Masha also took to the Chinese platform Weibo to call on people to quit making jokes about the war.
“These online jokes about the war are deeply hurting the feelings of the Ukrainian people, and also affecting our Chinese friends living and working here,” she said. “In the past couple days, there has been a difference in atmosphere … maybe your jokes are having an adverse effect on them.”
The Chinese embassy issued a statement in the early hours of Saturday morning, calling on Chinese nationals to conceal their identities, and not to display the Chinese flag.
The official China News Service also called on social media users to “learn to put themselves in others’ shoes, be considerate of the suffering of others during a war, stay moral, and speak rationally about the war, and don’t be a jeering spectator.”
Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.