FALSE: On September 6, 200,000 young men aged 18–22 left Ukraine

Information is being spread online claiming that, allegedly, on September 6, about 200,000 people left Ukraine, most of them men under 22. This is related to the Cabinet of Ministers’ decision allowing men aged 18–22 to travel abroad, and fears that the travel ban might soon be reinstated. The claim is illustrated with a video showing a group of teenagers boarding a train.

This is false. According to data from the State Border Guard Service, only 52,000 people left Ukraine on September 6. It is unknown how many of them were men aged 18–22, but even the total number is almost four times smaller than stated in the Russian claim. The video shows a children’s basketball club traveling to a training camp in the Vinnytsia region.

What is actually happening in the video?

Using Google reverse image search, we found the original video on the Instagram page of the children’s basketball team “Skhid” from Lozova, Kharkiv region. The children in the video were not going abroad but heading to a training camp at the Bar Sports School in the Vinnytsia region.

The video was posted on July 25, i.e., before the Cabinet resolution was adopted. The next day, the account shared another video showing the teenagers boarding a bus labeled “Bar,” and later, a video from training at the Bar Sports School. This is confirmed by several details in other posts — for example, a banner with the school’s name and a sticker on the outer side of the window.

Official data on border crossings

According to the State Border Guard Service:

• On September 6 (the date mentioned in the post), 52,000 people left Ukraine in total, and 45,000 returned;
• On September 7 (the day the post was published), 49,000 left and 42,000 returned;
• On September 8, 41,000 left and 42,000 returned.

Thus, the actual number of people who left Ukraine on September 6 is much lower than the claimed 200,000. Moreover, the State Border Guard Service provides only aggregated data without breakdowns by gender or age. Accordingly, the number of men aged 18–22 was even smaller.

Earlier, Polish border guards commented on the situation after the travel permission for men aged 18–22 came into effect. The Bieszczady Border Guard Department of Poland reported that between August 28 and September 3, 6,100 young men aged 18–22 arrived from Ukraine. The week before (before the decision was adopted), there were about 500. The Nadbużański Department registered 4,605 Ukrainians aged 18–22 between August 28 and September 3, compared to 461 the previous week.

Thus, Poland recorded an increase in the migration flow of this gender-age group during the week, but it is still about 19 times fewer people than claimed by Russian sources. Polish border guards did not publish data specifically for September 6; however, if we average the numbers from August 28 to September 3, approximately 1,529 Ukrainians aged 18–22 crossed into Poland daily. There is no reason to believe that this number could have sharply increased in the following three days, so we can assume that on September 6, the number of young men traveling from Ukraine to Poland was within a similar range, approximately a few thousand.

Another important point — most Ukrainians usually cross through the Polish border. According to the State Border Guard Service, this was also the case from September 6 to 8:

• On September 6, out of 52,000 people who left, 31,000 crossed into Poland (59.6%)
• On September 7, out of 49,000 who left, 28,000 crossed into Poland (57.1%)
• On September 8, out of 41,000 who left, 24,000 crossed into Poland (58.5%)

This means that all other neighboring countries combined (Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, and Hungary) accounted for less than half of the total flow. If Poland registered only about 11,000 Ukrainians aged 18–22 during the week, the number of young men who left through other countries would be even smaller. Therefore, the figure of 200,000 is most likely inaccurate.