Ukrainian refugees
© RIA Novosti/Sergey Pivovarov
Around 10,000 Ukrainian citizens asked for refugee status or temporary asylum in Russia, deputy head of the Federal Migration Service's department in Moscow Marina Kapustina said in a public advisory council on Thursday. "More than 9,600 Ukrainian citizens asked for refugee status or temporary asylum," she said.

Over 23,000 Ukrainian refugees have fled to Russia, Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets said on Wednesday, June 25.

"We have set up 262 camps for temporary accommodation of refugees from Ukraine and 23,286 people are staying in them," she said. "This number is constantly changing because regions ... are making job offers and some refugees are changing their status to Russian citizenship and moving to Russian regions for permanent residence," the minister said.

She said the number of wounded persons coming from Ukraine had decreased after the ceasefire in the south-east of the neighbouring country.

More than 500,000 refugees from Ukraine have already crossed into Russia, Valentina Matviyenko, speaker of the Federation Council, the upper chamber of Russia's parliament has said. "More than 500,000 refugees from Ukraine, mostly women, children and elderly people, are staying in our [Russian] regions today," Matviyenko said, opening a session of the public committee to assist people from Ukraine's southeastern regions on Thursday. The southeast of Ukraine is currently facing a humanitarian catastrophe, she added. "Most of these people would like to receive refugee status. There are also people who would like to sit out this situation and return to their homes after everything returns to normal.