A Ukrainian family says the agony of the war in Ukraine has been exacerbated by what they call “impossible” requests from Canada for immigration, refugees and citizenship (IRCC), including a request for their daughter’s birth certificate just days after she was born in the bomb shelter of a maternity hospital in the devastated city of Chernigov.
Sergei Levchenko shares his family’s arduous journey exactly one week after he finally landed in Toronto with his wife and two daughters. A third daughter was already far away, studying in Moncton, NB
Most men of Levchenko’s age are barred from leaving Ukraine to take part in hostilities. But fathers with three or more children – or those with medical exceptions – are allowed.
In the hours before March 6, when baby Sophie was born, Levchenko and his wife Anna were forced to separate: she was in the maternity hospital, and he stayed in his apartment with his four-year-old daughter Alice.
Then his neighborhood was destroyed by Russian bombs.
“I felt like horror,” Levchenko said.
He immediately grabbed his daughter.
“I just covered it because the bombing was huge at the time. I just prayed he wouldn’t come to our building. “
Anna had heard of the attack, but there was no way to contact her husband.
“Until the morning, she doesn’t know if we were alive or not,” Levchenko said.
The phones had to be turned off at night so they could not be traced by Russian intelligence.
She immediately suspects the worst.
Fortunately, they survived, but the family says they were not ready for the next battle: coming to Canada.
They had already begun the process, but needed a visa for baby Sophie, born in a war zone. The family says Canada has requested a birth certificate.
Thousands of kilometers away in Toronto, Nick Zotkin, a native of Ukraine, and his partner Rob Esselmont heard about Levchenko’s struggle online and immediately jumped in to help.
“How can a birth certificate be issued when she has given birth in a shelter?” Zotkin said.
Zotkin and Esselmont, who have already spent $ 20,000 of their own money, work in their spare time to bring a total of 17 Ukrainians to seven families in Canada and describe the bureaucracy as a “nightmare.”
“The right hand doesn’t speak to the left. And that’s so infuriating,” Esselmont said.
“It’s like a circle,” Zotkin added.
Sergei Levchenko shares his family’s arduous journey from Ukraine after eventually landing in Toronto with his wife and two daughters.
Inside their apartment in what they call their “migration office”, the couple hung passport photos of families trying to bring to Canada.
“It makes you feel insignificant. It’s as if these people don’t mean anything. And they do,” Esselmont said, pointing to a photo of the Ukrainians he wants to help.
“They’re still sitting, sitting and waiting to get here. We have work to do for her. We have a place to live. Her son created this shirt,” he added, explaining that the child created the work for T – fundraising for shirts , the couple began to help Ukrainian families.
Omar Sachedina of CTV News spoke with Rob Esselmont and Nick Zotkin, who are working to help Ukrainians come to Canada.
While most of the people Esselmont and Zotkin are trying to support are still waiting abroad, the Levchenko family is trying to start a new life in Canada before Sergei, a sailor, leaves for Japan later this month.
The family spent two months gathering the necessary documents, traveling to five different countries on their way to Canada. Most recently, they were in Istanbul, Turkey, awaiting baby Sophie’s visa.
Zotkin knew an Airbnb host there who was offering a discount on an apartment. The problems surrounding the baby’s birth certificate were eventually resolved, allowing the family to come to Canada.
Sergei said that the trip to Canada would not have been possible without the support of the two men he did not even know.
And now he says he has the freedom to dream again, explaining that one day he would like to have a “big house with a pool, good business … for the rest of our lives.”
But in the short term there will be other priorities: baby Sophie.
Sergei says that only two months – born three days after his birthday – his daughter symbolizes the resilience of the Ukrainian people.
“She is a warrior,” he said.
“The children who were born during this period, I think, are the strongest people in the world.”
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