A race against the watch to find air tickets or bus tickets, the fear of being trapped and without money … Returned hastily, the young French young people who studied this semester in Russia now follow their courses at a distance.
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In the polluted atmosphere of Bichkek, Laure Storne, a 23-year-old French young, drags a suitcase made in a hurry. The capital of Kyrgyzstan, mountain countries stuck between China and Kazakhstan, is an old stage of the Silk Road. “But what do I do here?” Wondered, this student at Sciences Po, Tuesday 1 er March. Bichkek was his only exit door.
Laure is one of the French students who, for ten days, have been forced to flee Russia by all means. They are not very numerous: in his last countdown published in 2020, UNESCO identified 346 , which ranks Russia at 23 e Position of the destination countries of French students. Most have left the country, by bus, train, taxi where by the air via unlikely courses. For those who have passed the border, leave Russia has been a tear.
The young woman had arrived in Moscow on February 5th. She was about to spend a semester at MGIMO (Moscow International Relations State Institute), the historical partner of the Paris Institute of Political Studies. She had settled in an apartment in the center of Moscow, and started classes on February 7th. That day, another French is passing through the Russian capital: Emmanuel Macron, came on a diplomatic mission to meet Vladimir Putin. Charles, 19 years old student at Sciences Po, also freshly arrived at the Mgimo, remembers well. “At that moment, I was sure to spend all my semester in Russia,” says the young man, who said he had been very welcome.
“I was afraid to find myself stuck “
Everything has switched the week of February 21st. The first days, while the Russian president announces the recognition of the separatist republics of Louhansk and Donetsk and the burial of the diplomatic process with Ukraine, Laure Storne receives concordant messages from the French Embassy, Science Po and Mgimo : “Do not worry.” A short mantra.
The tension has become palpable at the end of the week, remembers Bastien Pruneau, with the first manifestations of Russian citizens violently repressed by the police, “people who are hawk, head against the walls”, testifies the student. On February 25, the French Embassy sends French citizens the recommendation to leave the country. On the 26th, Facebook and Twitter no longer work in Russia. Charles observes the airspaces close after each other. No time to lose, he jumps in the last airplane for Western Europe and finds herself in Athens on February 28 in the morning and in Paris the same evening.
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