The number of inbound border crossings into Ukraine exceeded its outbound crossings for the third week in a row, and the difference between the two continues to grow: it reached 36,000 this week, up from 21,000 a week ago and 10,000 two weeks ago.
According to data from the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, published on Facebook, exit crossings rose from 348,000 last week to 360,000 this week, while entry crossings jumped even more – from 369,000 to 396,000.
The total number of border crossings in both directions reached 756 thousand for the week – this is the maximum since mid-March last year.
The number of vehicles crossing the western border of Ukraine, according to the agency, in the 31st week of the year also increased – from 140 thousand to 143 thousand, as well as the number of registered vehicles with humanitarian goods – from 788 to 839.
As indicated by the Western Regional Department of the State Border Service, since the beginning of the summer season through checkpoints in Lviv region crossed the state border in both directions 3 million 111 thousand citizens and almost 600 thousand vehicles.
“Characteristics of passenger traffic for two months indicates that during July the number of travelers increased by 326 thousand, transport – by 28 thousand units”, – noted in the Department, also indicating that in July the number of citizens who proceeded to enter Ukraine, prevails over the number of missed on the exit.
It is indicated that the busiest checkpoints remain “Krakivets” and “Shehyni” out of six, round-the-clock functioning in the region. On Friday, August 4, queues to leave Ukraine ranged from 50 to 140 cars at all checkpoints.
“We recommend citizens to follow the approximate state of the queues in front of the checkpoints on the page of the Western Regional Directorate on Facebook. And travelers who follow through Poland in transit, choose for crossing the border checkpoints within the Transcarpathian and Chernivtsi regions”, – added in the Department.
Border Guard Service of Poland for the last seven days also recorded a significant increase in the excess of flow into Ukraine over the flow out – up to 28.5 thousand from 16.5 thousand last week and 9.4 thousand – two weeks earlier.
According to the Polish ministry, the number of people entering Poland from Ukraine increased from 223.8 thousand to 231.8 thousand during the week, while the return flow from Poland to Ukraine increased from 240.3 thousand to 260.3 thousand.
In general, since the beginning of the war, by August 4, 2023, 14.28 million people arrived in Poland from Ukraine, while 12.50 million people traveled in the opposite direction.
As reported, since May 10, 2022, the outflow of refugees from Ukraine was replaced by an inflow, which lasted until September 23 and amounted to 409 thousand people.
However, since the end of September, possibly under the influence of news about mobilization in Russia and “pseudo-referendums” in the occupied territories, and then massive shelling of energy infrastructure, an excess of the number of those leaving over those entering was recorded. It temporarily stopped in the second half of December and the beginning of January for the period of holidays, but from the second week of January it resumed again and in total since the end of September by the anniversary of the full-scale war reached 223 thousand people.
From that time until today, thanks to the statistics of the last three weeks, the number of border crossings to enter Ukraine has exceeded the number of border crossings to leave Ukraine by 60 thousand.
As Deputy Minister of Economy Serhiy Sobolev noted in early March, the return of every 100 thousand Ukrainians home gives a 0.5% increase in GDP.
According to the UNHCR, the number of Ukrainian refugees in Europe as of August 1 was estimated at 5.873 million, and in the whole world – at 6.231 million, which is 12,000 and 13,000 more than a week ago.
In Ukraine itself, according to the UN data as of the end of May, there were 5.088m internally displaced persons.
