'We are desperate': Ukrainians in student accommodation face uncertain fate

A student village in Cork must be vacated by refugees before the beginning of the college term

Ukrainian refugee Oxana Savela with her daughter Vlada and her sister Polina Movhav who are temporarily staying at the student village accommodation on the Carrigrohane Rd, Cork. Picture: David Creedon

In the courtyard of one student accommodation village in Cork, the grass is battered and trampled to a crisp. Not by tank tracks or any kind of war machine that plagues Ukraine today, but by children.

There is no war at the student village, and the distant shelling of their homes seems light years away, as children race about on bikes and little tractors and kick footballs on the grass — or what is left of it after some serious playtime was had this summer.