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Comment by georgecmu | Hacker News Reader

And Ukrainian paramilitaries beating up Indians at checkpoints definitely didn't help their case.

https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/politics/indian-students-i...

The backstory - from what I've gathered so far after reading way too much in the last hours - is that there is some confusion here. The border is officially closed for men of fighting age, women and children are being led through, and are given transportation.

Badly communicated orders are apparently the cause of the males being stopped from crossing, and in the confrontation there were some scuffles. You don't get to demand your rights and confront a bunch of soldiers that may well not speak English and/or have been given strict but ultimately faulty instructions.

So this is all probably true but needs a lot more context.

> confront a bunch of soldiers that may well not speak English and/or have been given strict but ultimately faulty instructions.

They cant see the Indian passport and then just allowing them to leave?

They absolutely should have. But this is a pretty tense situation with hundreds of thousands of people trying to get out and many people that are refused exit are getting belligerent. Ukraine has decreed a mandatory immediate conscription and obviously that should only be for Ukrainian citizens. It's a very messy situation at the border, waiting times right now are decreasing a bit because there are no more id checks on the Ukranian side (like there were before) so hopefully the flow of refugees will speed up, the wait earlier today was 60(!, not a typo) hours.

This incident likely happened at the Polish border where the lines were longest and there were the most problems, if anybody is still trekking towards the border and they have the choice between Hungary, Romania or Poland I would advise to take the Hungarian or the Romanian route because the lines there are - from what I hear - considerably shorter and there are less problems at those borders.

Pretty intense situation and they still got time for racism.

Racism is pretty strong in Eastern Europe.

This wasn't informed by racism from what I understand but much simpler: the students were males and did not understand that right now it is transport is reserved for women and children first. You don't get to jump the line right now, and the Polish border is a relatively safe place.

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