Ukraine invasion: Family 'overwhelmed' by donations for refugees

Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians have fled their country since the war started

A family who launched an appeal to help get aid to Ukrainian refugees say they've been "overwhelmed" by the response.

Sarah Redmond from Eccleshall in Staffordshire said since posting a message on her local Facebook group she had been "inundated" with donations.

She said her husband had had the idea to collect essential items after the family had returned from a holiday in Poland on Friday.

"It all feels very personal," she said.

"My father was a refugee as a child after the second world war and settled in Staffordshire after being in a refugee camp.

"He then spent the majority of his childhood and adulthood here before returning to Poland."

According to the United Nations' refugee agency more than 442,000 refugees have left Ukraine fleeing from the Russian attack on their country, many crossing into Poland.

The number of refugees is expected to increase as Russian forces attempt to seize control of Ukrainian cities including the capital Kyiv.

The family is collecting essential items for people who have fled Ukraine

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The invasion by Russia had had a "really fundamental affect on myself, my husband and the children and friends that we were travelling with," she said.

The idea to help collect blankets and essential items had been a "relatively small" one initially, she said, with her husband offering to drive donations down to a Polish centre in London.

"We put a post on our local Facebook site, and to say that it's snowballed is no exaggeration," she added.

"We've been inundated from the moment that we posted," she said.

"What we'd really like to do is identify any other charitable organisations that might be supporting refugees - perhaps via Moldovia, Hungary or Slovakia that could benefit from our donations - we could do with widening it out."