The Ukrainian refugee service center at the Fira de Barcelona opens without sufficient means to process permits

Refugees from Ukraine in front of the door of the attention center set up at the Fira de Barcelona. Enric Fontcuberta (EFE)

The care center for Ukrainian refugees in Catalonia opened this Friday in Barcelona, ​​at half speed, in one of the pavilions of the Fira de Montjuïc.

From the very first hour, even at dawn, several dozen people have gathered, especially women with children, who have arrived fleeing the war.

The surprise has been that those who seek to process the express residence and work permits promised by the Spanish Government with the National Police are invited to call a telephone to make an appointment.

And the telephone (91 047 44 44) does not answer, they point out, patients, the concentrates.

The Fira space does attend, through the Red Cross, to people who still do not have accommodation: attention of a more social nature.

There are also 200 beds in case someone needs to rest, but they are not for overnight stays.

And a space to attend and entertain the little ones.

In the center there will also be information devices from the Generalitat and the City Council to direct families to specific issues: schooling, health, social services or any other issue they may need (from a document to glasses they have lost during the trip).

More information

Barcelona opens a “single window” for the arrival of increasingly vulnerable refugees

Sources from the Government Delegation assure that inside the pavilion there are police officers processing permits for Ukrainians who arrive with an appointment, but this is not the case for the vast majority of people who come to the center.

On the street, the refugees are served by easily identifiable Ukrainian translators in ministry vests.

The two huge wooden doors painted yellow only open the moment someone enters or leaves the premises.

In Pozuelo de Alarcón (Madrid), the center authorized by the ministry initially opened without an appointment, but today it is already requested to order the avalanche of applicants.

Appointments are taking place this Friday for April 3.

The Government has set up a third large refugee reception center in Alicante.

Pilgrimage to obtain documentation

"The administration fills its mouth with I don't know how many things and expects us to do the job for them, because they don't attend to them here," criticized a citizen of Barcelona this morning who accompanied two families that he has welcomed into his home.

The concentrated refugees report that after having had to flee the war they arrive in Catalonia and are involved in a window pilgrimage to obtain documentation that all the authorities talk about on TV, they say.

“We have been staying at the house of some friends in Sant Boi de Llobregat since March 5 and we have gone to the police station there, to the Verneda police station in Barcelona (where there is a long queue), to the Saier of the City Council (where they have given us appointment for April 4), and now here”, lamented patient Lisandra, a teacher of Cuban origin who has lived in Ukraine for years with her husband, a local, and their two children.

She was grateful, the two children will start going to school on Monday, but her face accumulates tiredness after the 10 days it took to get from the war to Sant Boi.

She also has the face of an exhausted Tania Kniazink, who drove alone from Vinitza to Valls, where her uncle lives.

This Friday she has traveled to Barcelona by train and she cannot believe that the trip is useless.

"The telephone does not work.

The translators tell me to call tomorrow.

I won't be back until I have an appointment,” she would say with a shrug.

The woman has left her parents and her husband in Kniazink.

Ukrainians who arrive in Barcelona have 90 days to be in Spain until their situation is regularized.

From the Barcelona City Council, the deputy mayor Jordi Martí has ​​indicated that the council and the Fira have limited themselves to giving up the space and has expressed his confidence that the Government and the Delegation "will provide the necessary resources" so that the situation of inattention regarding permits is resolved.

The Red Cross attends the fair space to women and children who arrive without references in Catalonia

From the Generalitat, the Minister of Equality and Feminism, Tània Verge, has estimated that there are around 8,000 Ukrainian refugees expected to arrive in Catalonia, and has indicated that the 500,000 euros allocated by the Government to cover their needs will be insufficient, so who hopes that the Government derives European aid.

Although initially it was not planned, both the Generalitat de Catalunya and the Barcelona City Council will also have a physical presence at the refugee reception center set up by the Fira ministry.

The Generalitat and the City Council will inform newcomers about where they can carry out the procedures they need: for education, health, social services or any other need.

They will also pay special attention to groups such as women victims of violence or members of the LGTBI community.