'No, I can’t pack my bags,' says Ukranian mother told to move from Killarney

'I don't have words,' says Hanna (Anna) Bieliaieva, who has been told she and her two sons have to move on Wednesday after building a life in Killarney.

Hanna Bieliavieva has been told she is to depart Hotel Killarney at 11am on Wednesday on a bus bound for Westport.

The Ukrainian refugee arrived in Killarney with her two sons, aged six and eight, from a camp in Poland in March. She is from Kharkiv. She works at Hotel Killarney as an accommodation assistant.

“I’m alone,” Hanna, known as Anna, said. 

I don’t have my husband. My father and mother are in Kharkiv."

“I don’t have words,” she said of being told that she was being moved with just 48 hours' notice. 

She is one of the 135 mostly female Ukrainian residents who now been given times for their buses, which are to collect them and take them to Westport on Wednesday.

The “Dear Resident” letter they received on Monday speaks of how they have been the beneficiary of temporary protection in Hotel Killarney.

“However it is no longer possible to accommodate you at this location and, accordingly, new accommodation is being provided to you," the letter from the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth set out.

In red writing the new location from Wednesday, October 12 was listed as Hotel Westport with “time to be decided”.

Due to the acute shortage of accommodation available should they refuse the relocation offer the refugees will not be provided with any other, they were told.

They will also not be permitted to remain in their current accommodation.

In bold writing, underlined, this was followed by a warning not to attend the transit hub at City West “as you will not be permitted access.” The residents were also advised they could source their own accommodation.

If they had schoolgoing children enrolled in schools they could contact Tusla Education Support Services they were told.

“It’s impossible,” Anna said of being forced to relocate with just 48 hours' notice. It had taken her children a long time to settle, and now they loved their “amazing school”.

“It’s the best school," said Anna. "It has the best teachers.” 

Her children have Irish friends.

“I don’t want to move,” she said in tears.

I am happy in Killarney. I work here. I have good work. My children are in a very good school. No, I can’t pack my bags."

She had arrived with nothing but a backpack, and the people of Killarney had brought toys and clothes.

“All the women now are in stress,” she said.

Hotel Killarney. Photo: hotelkillarney.ie

Anna described what was happening as “like a tree” being uprooted from where it was planted.

I am not going on the bus,” she said.

She has signed a petition to Children's Minister Roderic O'Gorman, pleading with him to allow her to remain.

Other women work in pharmacies, in hotels, and in retail.

“Most want to stay,” she said. “In Kharkiv is now many missiles. I am very worried.”

'Son was crying'

Julia Bondazenko arrived in March from the Donbas region with her two children, a boy aged 11 and a girl aged seven. Her husband drove here two weeks ago.

The children are very happy at St Oliver’s and her son was crying last night at having to leave his friends in Killarney.

His two best friends live in Killarney and he visits their homes and they come here,” she said.

Julia, who works in the Great Southern Hotel, says she is not moving and will live in the family car.

'Wholly unjust'

Colm O’Súilleabháin, principal of St Oliver’s National School in Ballycasheen, where many of the children were attending, said he and other school principals were “demoralised” after putting so much work and effort into integrating the Ukrainian community.

“The integration was working,” said Mr O’Súilleabháin.

St Oliver’s is near Hotel Killarney where many of the up to 40 Ukrainian children at the hotel attend school.

“At this point, to move them is wholly unjust,” said Mr O’Súilleabháin.

It was not a question of prioritising one group over another, and the men arriving at Hotel Killarney, which is now a direct provision centre, had every right to be in Killarney, Mr O’Súilleabháin stressed.

But the fact was the group of Ukrainians in the hotel have been in Killarney for over six months and had settled in with their children.

Huge supports have been put in place, and the supports are working,” he said. 

"There is integration."

The primary school principal had taken a call from Seán Coffey, principal of St Brendan’s Secondary school in Killarney, where some of the teenagers attend. He is equally disappointed, Mr O’Súilleabháin said.

There had been “a huge co-ordinated response” from the Killarney community in March when the refugees arrived.

Parents associations had also worked hard at the integration, and there had been coffee mornings and social walks in the national park.