Young Ukrainians are crossing the Polish border en masse: statistics from border guards

Between August 28 and September 19, 2025, border guards conducted about 53,000 checks on male Ukrainian citizens aged 18 to 22 on the Ukrainian-Polish border. Of these, almost 40,000 cases were on entry into Poland, and more than 13,000 on exit from its territory.

This is stated in the response of the Border Guard of the Republic of Poland (Straż Graniczna) to the request of the editorial staff of “Ukrainian Truth. Life”.

Polish border guards did not provide details on how many of the checked individuals managed to successfully cross the border.

The service explained that the data provided refers to the number of checks conducted, not unique individuals crossing the border. In other words, the same person could have been checked multiple times, which affects the overall statistics.

“The Border Service operates exclusively with data on the number of border checks, not the number of people who actually entered or left the territory of Poland,” they emphasized in the response to the request.

It is also not reported how many men in this age category were denied entry.

We would like to remind you that after the Ukrainian government allowed men aged 18–22 to travel abroad on August 28, there has been a noticeable increase in the flow of young citizens towards European countries. This is especially noticeable in the Polish direction, where the number of departures increased more than 10 times in the first week after the changes came into force.

As reported, after the government allowed men aged 18 to 22 to temporarily cross the state border in late August, Ukraine has seen an active movement of young people from a number of regions . The dynamics are particularly noticeable in the western part of the country.

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