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The United for Ukraine Group has exceeded 284,000 members and continues to grow, and Romanian volunteers opened their homes, transported Ukrainians from the borders by their cars, bought them train and plane tickets, took their animals to the vet, gave them clothes, food and money, MEP Vlad Gheorghe said on Friday, told Agerpres.
"The Romanians stayed days and nights to welcome mothers and children who fled from the bombs. (...) They sent donations across the borders, from tonnes of flour for the bread of those left under the bombs to food for the animals in the shelters. The local authorities, telephone companies, banks, NGOs communicated their messages on our group. Romanians baptized babies born on Romanian soil and 'adopted' Ukrainian families at holiday meals. Ukrainians organized garbage collection campaigns, they wrote wishes for Romania's Day, they thanked us with traditional products, drawings and handicrafts," Vlad Gheorghe wrote on Facebook on Friday.
He mentioned that this is the second aid group for Ukrainians in Europe, after a similar one in Poland, a country with twice the population of Romania.
Vlad Gheorghe said that, in twelve months, the group had 165,272 posts, 782,511 comments, 4,696,539 reactions and 31,035,560 users saw what was discussed.
"We were the first: in the group, in the customs, in the stations. There were 1,756 posts, 7,768 comments and 45,587 reactions per group on the first day of the war. On February 26, the number of posts had increased almost 10 times, to 16,254, and the cases were solved instantly by group. We organized ourselves exemplary before the Romanian Government moved anything. In the first days there were already thousands of people registered on our forms - translators and volunteers who offered accommodation, transport, donations in products and money from the country and from the diaspora," pointed out Vlad Gheorghe.
He informed that the group united Romanians from all corners of the world. Volunteer moderators managed the group from all time zones, from New Zealand to Canada.
