KYIV — Millions of Ukrainians face another winter of hardship as attacks on critical infrastructure, damaged housing and rising living costs threaten to force more people from their homes, the United Nations migration agency said on Friday, according to Reuters.
“Winter is fast approaching in Ukraine, and for many Ukrainians, the months ahead could be the most difficult since the full-scale war began,” Dejan Keserovic, the International Organization for Migration’s deputy chief of mission in Ukraine, told reporters in Geneva via video link from Kyiv.
Nearly 3.6 million people remain internally displaced across Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, according to the latest IOM figures, while an estimated 3.8 million have returned after displacement, often to damaged or partially destroyed homes. The agency said Ukrainians who returned to their homes within the last three months are the most likely to say they intend to leave again, reflecting concern about deteriorating living conditions.
The pressure is physical before it is anything else. Repeated Russian strikes on energy and other critical infrastructure have put increasing strain on Ukraine’s electricity, heating and water systems, while drone and missile attacks continue to kill and injure civilians across the country, the IOM said. Russia fired hundreds of ballistic missiles over the summer and early autumn and is widely expected to target critical infrastructure, including heating and power sites, into the winter, according to Reuters reporting on the battlefield.
For families in damaged buildings, winter turns shortages that are manageable in October into emergencies by January. A home with broken windows, intermittent power and no reliable heating is habitable in autumn and dangerous in deep cold, which is why aid agencies treat the weeks before temperatures fall as the decisive window for repairs, generators, insulation and cash assistance.
The displacement figures also reach beyond Ukraine’s borders. European countries such as Poland, Germany and the Czech Republic currently host around 6 million Ukrainian refugees, the IOM said, and Keserovic said he expected host countries to be preparing for more Ukrainians to leave if the situation deteriorates over the winter.
Background: Ukraine has endured repeated winter campaigns against its energy system since 2022, and each year the accumulated damage, rather than any single strike, has deepened the hardship. This week’s warnings came as Russian missiles and drones again rained down on Ukrainian cities, amid fears in Kyiv that the United States could pull back intelligence sharing and weapons support, adding political uncertainty to the physical one.
Why it matters: the IOM’s warning reframes the coming winter as a displacement story as much as a military one. If heating and power failures push a new wave of families from their homes, the effect will be felt in Ukrainian cities first and in European host countries soon after, regardless of how the front line itself moves.
What happens next: aid agencies are seeking to position supplies and repair capacity before the coldest months. Ukrainian officials continue to press partners for air defence systems able to protect energy sites, a request that runs through every winter planning discussion in Kyiv and in European capitals.
Source: Reuters reporting on the IOM briefing, October 16, 2026.
