Moroccan students account for the second-largest community of international students in Ukraine after India, with an estimated number of about 10,000 to 11,000 students, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)’s recent data.
Most of those students found themselves drawn to Ukrainian universities to pursue studies for reputable schooling and low costs, specializing mainly in medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, and engineering.
Overall, nearly 23,000 students from Africa found themselves stranded in Ukraine after the Russian offensive that began on February 24, according to UNESCO’s report.
This number of students revealed that Ukraine is among the favored academic destinations for most African students in recent years, not only Moroccans.
In addition to Morocco, Nigeria, Egypt, Tunisia, and Ghana are among the African countries with the largest student communities in Ukrainian universities.
Additionally, a total of 76,000 students from different nationalities used to live in Kharkiv, Kyiv, Lviv, Kherson, Sumy, and Odesa, including 23,000 students from Africa, according to the same source.
The number of African students continued to increase over the past 3 years, making Ukraine the 5th best study destination, behind France, the US, the UK, and Malaysia.
This increase in the number of African students is the fruit of Ukraine’s long-term strategy, which targets middle-income countries such as those of the Grand Maghreb region through facilitating the integration, and visa procedures for students.
Morocco’s efforts to repatriate stranded students in Ukraine
As tensions between both Russia and Ukraine began to grow, the Moroccan Embassy in Ukraine called on Moroccan citizens to leave the country on February 12, for their own safety, through available commercial flights.
Shortly after the launch of the Russian offensive on February 24, the Moroccan Embassy in Ukraine advised Moroccan citizens to leave the Ukrainian territory through border crossings and access neighboring countries, namely Poland, Romania, Hungary, or Slovakia, where reception and escort cells were established by the Moroccan diplomatic teams in those countries.
Morocco’s flag carrier Royal Air Maroc (RAM) operated 15 repatriation flights from Ukraine and neighboring countries, mostly composed of students, with a fixed rate of MAD 750.
Return of Moroccan students to home country
Thousands of students returned to Morocco, temporarily halting their studies, amid the ongoing Russian offensive.
Shortly after, Morocco’s Ministry for Higher Education launched a digital platform aiming to collect data on the repatriated students and is currently studying their possible admission into Moroccan universities.
Most recently, the Ukrainian ambassador to Morocco told Hespress AR in an interview that the Ukrainian Ministry of Education will announce new measures by April regarding the schedule and resumption of studies, with the possible announcement of a temporary halt in academic institutions until the end of the conflict.
“We reached out to the Moroccan Foreign Affairs Minister in order to hold talks about the situation of Moroccan students in Ukraine so that they would be able to finish studies within their Ukrainian universities,” she added.
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