Displacement
Displacement and refugees
Who left the country, who moved inside it, and what temporary-protection and return policy does to both.
Conflict coverage · Eastern Europe
AssessmentModerate confidence
Broad regional level only. This surface never maps aid routes, facility locations or operational detail. Humanitarian agencies have no access to Russian-occupied territory; figures for those areas are floors, not counts.
Current state
What civilian pressure looks like now
Moderate confidence · Data as of 2026-07
The war has produced Europe's largest displacement crisis since the Second World War, and its humanitarian geography is double: a frontline and deep-strike emergency inside Ukraine, and a continent-wide displacement absorbed largely by European host states. Figures below are agency estimates at broad regional level, and the least visible part of the crisis — the occupied territories — is the least counted.
6.8M+
Refugees recorded abroad
UNHCR-recorded; most under temporary protection in Europe
~3.7 million
Internally displaced
IOM/OCHA estimates; frontline evacuations shift the total continuously
10.8 million
People in need
OCHA humanitarian needs and response plan for 2026, launched 13 January 2026. Lower than the 2025 figure this record previously carried, which reflects a reassessed caseload rather than an improvement on the ground.
16,874
Verified civilian deaths
OHCHR-verified floor since 24 February 2022, including 820 children. Verification lags and occupied areas are largely unverifiable, so the actual total is considerably higher.
51,273
Verified civilian injuries
OHCHR-verified floor since 24 February 2022, including 3,126 children. Recorded separately from deaths because the two move differently — wide-area weapons injure far more people than they kill.
4.1 million
People targeted for response
The prioritised subset of the 10.8 million, against a stated requirement of US$2.3 billion. Targeting is set by what the appeal can plausibly fund, not by the extent of need.
~20% of territory
Suspected mine / ERW contamination
About 139,000 km² considered potentially hazardous in 2026 mine-action reporting; suspected, not confirmed — survey work steadily releases cleared land, and broader definitions in circulation reach 25–30%
Changed in brief2026-08-02 · Humanitarian updated
Civilian pressure, as analytical objectsWhat is under pressure in Ukraine–Russia, as 7 selectable objects. Each carries its own figures, the module's analysis of it and — where the corpus establishes one — the mechanism by which security conditions reach it.Interrogate Ukraine–Russia in Explore
Civilian harm
Civilian harm
Verified civilian deaths and injuries, and the distance between what is verified and what is reported.
Protection
The occupied territories
Populations under occupation, the status imposed on them, and what independent monitoring can and cannot see.
Health & services
Health, education and demining
The services floor under sustained strikes, and the contaminated ground that shapes what can be rebuilt.
Civilian infrastructure
Energy and civilian infrastructure
The power, heat and water systems struck through successive winters, and what restoration keeps up with.
Contamination
Contamination and blocked return
Mines and explosive remnants across a thousand-kilometre front, and the land and return they hold back.
Assistance & funding
The response and its funding
How many people the response plans for, how many it reaches, and what a funding shortfall removes first.
The full picture5 blocks of analysis and 7 dated figures, filed under the pressures above — the module’s own words, with their own vintages
Everything below is authored on this module’s humanitarian record. Figures carry the vintage of the release that produced them, not the date of this page: the section is graded Moderate confidence and its data is stated as of 2026-07.
Displacement and refugeesDisplacement
| Indicator | Value | As of | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Refugees recorded abroadUNHCR-recorded; most under temporary protection in EuropeSources: UNHCR Ukraine situation data↗ | 6.8M+ | 2026-06 | High confidence |
| Internally displacedIOM/OCHA estimates; frontline evacuations shift the total continuouslySources: IOM displacement tracking (Ukraine) | ~3.7 million | 2025-12 | Moderate confidence |
Displacement and refugees
As of 2026
Displacement runs in layers: refugees across Europe under temporary protection, millions displaced inside Ukraine, and mandatory evacuations that empty frontline settlements as the line creeps. Returns track security and housing, not sentiment — every strike campaign against cities and the grid pushes the calculus back. Host states have extended protection repeatedly, but long-term status, schooling and labour-market integration are quietly becoming permanent-emigration questions.
Sources: UNHCR Ukraine situation data↗ · UN OCHA humanitarian reporting (Ukraine)↗
What to watch
- Temporary-protection and return policyHost-state decisions on protection status, benefits and labour access will shape whether displacement hardens into permanent emigration.
Parties:UkraineEuropean UnionPoland
Civilian harmCivilian harm
| Indicator | Value | As of | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Verified civilian deathsOHCHR-verified floor since 24 February 2022, including 820 children. Verification lags and occupied areas are largely unverifiable, so the actual total is considerably higher.Sources: OHCHR Ukraine civilian casualty monitoring↗ | 16,874 | 2026-07 | High confidence |
| Verified civilian injuriesOHCHR-verified floor since 24 February 2022, including 3,126 children. Recorded separately from deaths because the two move differently — wide-area weapons injure far more people than they kill.Sources: OHCHR Ukraine civilian casualty monitoring↗ | 51,273 | 2026-07 | High confidence |
Civilian harm
As of 2026-08
OHCHR's individually verified casualty counts are deliberate undercounts — verification lags, and occupied areas are largely unverifiable. Long-range missiles and drones keep every Ukrainian city in range, and the rise in casualties far from the front since 2024 reflects that reach. Near the line, glide bombs have demolished whole towns; most verified casualties come from explosive weapons with wide-area effects. Ballistic-heavy strikes on cities are the sharpest expression of this: the 31 July 2026 attack on Kyiv, in which Ukraine reported intercepting one of 27 ballistic missiles, killed ten people as of 2 August and damaged residential buildings, public infrastructure and a school. July 2026 was the deadliest month for civilians since March 2022 — 437 killed and 2,610 injured, against at least 429 missiles launched, more than double June's figure. The composition of that harm is the analytically important part, because each strand is answered by a different defensive system: long-range missiles and drones caused 38 per cent of casualties, short-range drones 27 per cent, and aerial bombardment — principally glide bombs — rose 143 per cent on June to become the second leading cause. Why so few ballistic missiles are intercepted is genuinely unresolved and this module does not pick between the available explanations; what can be said is that the categories of civilian harm do not share a single remedy, so no one decision about supply would address them together.
The occupied territoriesProtection
Occupied territories
As of 2026
The occupied territories are the crisis's least visible layer: no humanitarian access, pressure to accept Russian citizenship documented in UN reporting, and the reported deportation or transfer of Ukrainian children — the subject of International Criminal Court arrest warrants issued in 2023. What can be verified there is a fraction of what is reported; this module treats all figures for those areas as floors.
What to watch
- Access to occupied territoriesAny monitored humanitarian access to occupied areas would be a structural change — and its absence keeps every figure there a floor.
Health, education and deminingHealth & services
Health, education and demining
As of 2026
Attacks on health care number in the thousands of WHO-verified incidents since 2022. Education near the front has moved online or underground — including metro-station schools in Kharkiv — trading a generation's schooling against safety. Mine and unexploded-ordnance contamination across former battlefield and border regions constrains agriculture and returns, and will outlast the war by decades.
Parties:Ukraine
Energy and civilian infrastructureCivilian infrastructure
Energy and civilian infrastructure
As of 2026-08
Since October 2022 Russia has run seasonal strike campaigns against the power grid and gas infrastructure, timed to winter. Ukraine has answered with layered air defence, rapid repair and decentralised generation, but each campaign forces blackout cycles and strains water and heating systems that depend on the grid. Infrastructure endurance — interceptor stocks, transformer replacement — is a humanitarian variable as much as a military one. What moved in 2026 was the politics of supply rather than supply itself: licensed domestic production of Patriot interceptors was pledged at a NATO summit on 20 July, publicly disowned by the US president on 31 July, described by the US ambassador to NATO on 3 August as something that would not be concluded before this winter, and asserted as decided by President Zelensky in August without US confirmation. As of 14 August 2026 no licence, contract or delivery had been established — a proposal in dispute, not a medium-term remedy.
Sources: UN OCHA humanitarian reporting (Ukraine)↗ · Ukrainian energy-system operator statements
How security conditions reach this
Grid campaign → heat, water and health services in winter
What losing electricity in January actually does to a household, a hospital and a water pump.
- Affected area or systemConfirmed
- Access or service disruptionConfirmed
- Civilian conditionConfirmed
- Broader humanitarian significancePlausible exposure
What to watch
- Winter strike campaigns vs grid resilienceInterceptor availability and transformer stocks decide how each heating season is survived — the quiet determinant of civilian endurance and of the next displacement wave.
Access depends on:Electricity generation and fuel supply
Contamination and blocked returnContamination
| Indicator | Value | As of | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Suspected mine / ERW contaminationAbout 139,000 km² considered potentially hazardous in 2026 mine-action reporting; suspected, not confirmed — survey work steadily releases cleared land, and broader definitions in circulation reach 25–30%Sources: Mine-action survey and clearance reporting | ~20% of territory | 2026 | Moderate confidence |
How security conditions reach this
Attritional ground war → contamination → blocked return and lost land
The part of the war that keeps working after the shooting stops, on farmland and in the villages people want to go back to.
- Affected area or systemConfirmed
- Access or service disruptionConfirmed
- Civilian conditionConfirmed
- Broader humanitarian significancePlausible exposure
The response and its fundingAssistance & funding
| Indicator | Value | As of | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| People in needOCHA humanitarian needs and response plan for 2026, launched 13 January 2026. Lower than the 2025 figure this record previously carried, which reflects a reassessed caseload rather than an improvement on the ground.Sources: UN OCHA humanitarian reporting (Ukraine)↗ | 10.8 million | 2026-01 | High confidence |
| People targeted for responseThe prioritised subset of the 10.8 million, against a stated requirement of US$2.3 billion. Targeting is set by what the appeal can plausibly fund, not by the extent of need.Sources: UN OCHA humanitarian reporting (Ukraine)↗ | 4.1 million | 2026-01 | High confidence |
What to watch
- Response-plan fundingAppeal coverage is falling as global crises compete; funding levels set the floor for evacuations, winterisation and frontline aid.
Evidence and grading
- Figures
- Agency estimates on their own revision cycles. Each figure carries the date it is for; nothing on this surface averages, totals or compares across two vintages.
- Confidence
- How well established Vigil considers this assessment to be. It is not a measure of how severe the situation is.