Hello everyone!
I will start not with the official "Good evening, dear Ukrainians", but with forgotten, yet very topical today - "Good health to you!"
First of all, I am grateful to everyone who listened to the advice and stayed home today.
This is really very important for your life and your health. There is another positive thing about quarantine: for the first time in a long time, the level of air pollution in Kyiv has sharply decreased. And this is good news.
Grocery stores, pharmacies, gas stations, banks, insurance companies and all government agencies operate. Special thanks to the Verkhovna Rada, which is not under quarantine.
MPs work in committees, and if it is necessary to pass urgent laws they can quickly assemble in the assembly hall.
The country has not stopped, the country is working.
Now about the Ukrainians who are unfortunately not home yet. It is about those who are abroad and did not manage to return until March 17.
The most important thing. We will return you all. Someone faster, someone a little later, but you will definitely be at home.
As for those who flew on vacation in a chartered plane.
Today, the state provides maximum assistance to tour operators and carriers to return Ukrainian tourists from remote corners of the world. We established the planned return of Ukrainians from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, the Dominican Republic, the resort islands of the Asia-Pacific region, from the North and South America.
As for the other citizens abroad. You need to take a few steps.
First. Sign up in a FRIEND system via this link. friend.mfa.gov.ua
There, inform the MFA of the country where you stay and provide as much information as possible about the problem in the “Comment on the Trip” section.
This will greatly help our diplomats and make it easier to create lists of citizens who are to return home as soon as possible.
If you haven’t managed to register, contact the Ukrainian Embassy or Consulate in the country where you stay. This can be done by email or hotline. You will find all the contacts on the official website of the respective institutions or on the MFA website.
Section: Embassies and Consulates. Subsection: Diplomatic Institutions.
You can also write on the pages of embassies and consulates on social media.
After that - wait for further instructions.
Special flights will be sent to the places where our citizens are most concentrated to bring you home.
It is also important. We have formed so-called hub points. Once you get there, you will be able to get to Ukraine for free or at discounted prices.
These are the cities of Istanbul, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Prague, Berlin, Warsaw, Przemyśl, Vienna, Bratislava, Riga and Vilnius.
All the detailed information will be on the official website of the MFA.
Fellow Ukrainians! I understand that it is not easy for you. Someone failed to return because the airline canceled flights, someone was stuck at the border, someone was quarantined in the hotel. But you should know that we will definitely get you out. Our ambassadors and consuls work around the clock. To solve your problems, the MFA and the Ministry of Infrastructure are fully mobilized.
Yesterday, 125 flights returned home 23,000 Ukrainians. Today - 50 flights and 10 thousand Ukrainians. Another 40 flights are scheduled for tomorrow.
Ukrainians arrive at the airports of Kyiv, Dnipro, Odesa, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv and Lviv. Aircrafts from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Egypt, Israel, Spain, Qatar, Moldova, the United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Turkey have already returned.
Ukrainians who plan to return to Ukraine by their own car or bus.
Please read carefully the restrictions in the countries through which your route will run. This information can be found in the news section on the Foreign Ministry's website. Also get yourself acquainted with the mode of operation of checkpoints on the state border of Ukraine.
The relevant interactive map is available on the New Customs website.
In addition, dear Ukrainians, please remember that it is important to observe not only personal, but also informational hygiene rules.
Trust information only from official sources. Then fables about spraying chemicals over Kyiv will not scare you, but make you laugh.
You can find out all the latest information about coronavirus countermeasures on the official website of the Ministry of Healthcare, Facebook pages and twitter feeds.
And also on official telegram-channels of the Ministry of Healthcare of Ukraine and Коронавірус_інфо.
The answers to the basic questions about COVID-19 are here: covid19.com.ua
And finally, I want to urge everyone again not to go outside without necessity and stay home. Let's make the most of this time and spend it with our loved ones. Let's watch good movies and read good books.
Now on social networks everyone asks each other tips on what to watch and what to read. My recommendation today is the following: Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk and The Museum of Abandoned Secrets by Oksana Zabuzhko. And I highly recommend a wonderful French film The Intouchables.
I wish all of us 36.6.
Take care of ourselves. Save Ukraine!