LAST UPDATE | 19 Jul 2022

THE FIRST UKRAINIAN refugees have arrived at Gormanston military camp in Co Meath, where they will stay in tented accommodation.

The first bus carrying the group of refugees arrived at the army camp shortly after 4pm this afternoon, after their details were processed at the Citywest transit hub.

Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman said the camp has a capacity for around 350 people, with a maximum stay of one week.

Some 150 people were to arrive today, most of whom were expected to be families.

Another 200 will likely be moved into the camp to reach its full capacity.

The measure is a response to a lack of space in State-provided accommodation for refugees fleeing the war in Ukraine.

The Citywest hotel and conference centre in west Dublin, which can accommodate about 2,300 people, reached full capacity last week. Some refugees were then sleeping in the Old Terminal Building at Dublin Airport.

The site at Gormanston in Co Meath is using Defence Forces marquee tents, with most set aside for beds but some for recreation and food. Around 16 people may be sleeping in one tent.

O’Gorman has said that the government does not see the Gormanston camp as a “long-term” solution.

“It’s not envisaged to be a long-term facility. It’s there as a an ability perhaps when numbers are high on Citywest that we can use that as a short-term accommodation before moving people out,” he said, speaking on RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland.

He estimated a maximum of a one-week stay.

“We’re in a wartime situation and in a wartime situation you experience surges of refugees arriving. We have experienced a surge over the last six to eight weeks,” O’Gorman said.

“We link it to the increase in attacks on civilian populations throughout Ukraine and I think we have managed the situation, managed the arrival of 42,000 Ukrainians and accommodating 30,000 of those over the course of the last number of months in a reasonably systematic way.

“But there are obviously going to be situations when you have surges. We had a surge last week. I think we’ve put in place measures to address it.”

Migrant and refugee rights organisation Nasc said it “came as a surprise” last week that the government did not have contingency plans in place for the City West facility reaching capacity.

“This should have been clear from days if not weeks beforehand,” it said.

“The number of Ukrainian refugees is lower than we had expected to receive in Ireland by this time; initially the government had forecast that 40,000 Ukrainians would have sought safety in Ireland by Easter.

“We know that the Department of Children officials are working around the clock to source accommodation but a ‘whole of government’ approach is now needed. Nasc, together with partners from the Ukraine Civil Society Forum, have been calling for a national lead for months.”

Nasc urged the government to ensure that the use of Gormanston is a temporary solution.

“We need to think ahead to autumn when approximately 4,000 people will have to move out of student accommodation and to winter when we may see increased flows of people and tented accommodation becomes even less suitable,” it said.

“We need to re-look at all the accommodation options from re-purposing old State buildings to having a reset on pledged accommodation.”

Yesterday, the government withdrew visa-free travel for some refugees coming to Ireland from safe European countries.

However, refugees from Ukraine will not be affected.

For other refugees, the government suspended the Council of Europe Agreement on the Abolition of Visas for one year, meaning that people who have been granted international protection in a signatory country can no longer travel to Ireland for a period of up to three months without a visa.

Justice Minister McEntee said the government was suspending the agreement due to concerns over abuse of the system.

- With reporting by Michelle Hennessy and Press Association