Ukrainian children and their mothers whose relatives were killed or went missing arrived in Portugal on Saturday for a three-week programme, as Russia's all-out war nears its four-year mark.
A group of 33 arrived at Lisbon airport shortly after 4 pm following a 20-hour bus journey from the Chernihiv region in northern Ukraine, near the Russian border. The group travelled overland to Poland before flying from Warsaw to Lisbon.
"We only made it to the border because the Ukrainian military police escorted the bus and cleared the roads that were closed," said Ângelo Neto, vice president of HelpUA.PT - Ukrainian Refugees UAPT, the organisation behind the initiative.
The children, aged five to 14, will stay at the Fénix centre in Ourém as part of the European Programme for Psychological and Cultural Support for Families at War.
The programme provides "intensive psychological rehabilitation, cultural integration and personal training" under the supervision of Portuguese and Ukrainian psychologists, therapists and volunteers.
'Bravery runs in their blood'
Justice Minister Rita Júdice, representing the government at the airport, said: "We really want these children to be able to experience peace during their time here."
"Many of them, between the ages of six and fourteen, have no memory other than that of war," she added.
"Being able to give them the experience of normality, where they can be children, where they can be mothers and grandmothers, there's a grandmother too, will be what Portugal can do at this stage."
Júdice said the welcome was "an affirmation of values, because justice doesn't end in the courts. Justice is also lived out in the defence of human rights, in the protection of the most vulnerable and in not normalising violence against anyone, especially children."
Teresa Leal Coelho, ambassador of the association and former Social Democrat MP who travelled with the group to Ukraine, said these families come from cities ravaged by war but want to maintain connections with their hometowns.
"Bravery runs in their blood. It's amazing how resilient they are," she told journalists. "These are people who don't want to leave the region where they live, they continue with a normal life, despite the war, despite spending many nights in bunkers."
The families will return to their hometowns after three weeks, as is their wish.
"They all said: 'no, we want to go back, we want to be with our husbands, with our fathers, we want to know what's going on'. They're defending our freedom and our Europe," Coelho said.
Neto said the initiative aims to expand. "We're talking about almost a million mothers in vulnerable situations in Ukraine. This project started in the UK, which received 400 families during 2025, and I hope, on behalf of Portugal, that we will exceed 500."
The Fénix centre in Ourém received a group of combatants and war wounded for rehabilitation in 2024.
