In the Alpes-Maritimes department, the Russian community is estimated at 100,000 people.
With the sanctions but quite simply with a new look at their population, the Russians have suffered since the beginning of the conflict from discrimination 2,000 km from the conflict.
They recall that they want “only an end to this disaster and peace” by emphasizing the “ties that unite the Ukrainian and Russian peoples”.
Every day for a week, the war in Ukraine has escalated.
Bombings, nuclear threats and in response from the European Union, economic sanctions, in particular on air traffic and banking services.
On the Côte d'Azur, where around 100,000 Russians are said to be settled, these measures "scare".
An expatriate student, who does not prefer to speak in depth on the subject, describes "a very difficult time to live" with "Russophobia" while "[her] nation never wanted this war".
Even at 2,000 km, this conflict is already having consequences on Olia's life.
In the garden of Saint-Nicolas Cathedral, one of the most important Russian Orthodox religious buildings outside of Russia, this Russian national who has lived in Nice for eleven years watches her children play.
“At school, Russian-speaking pupils are discriminated against by their classmates but also by their teachers.
I didn't think it would happen, I didn't think I had to prepare them to receive hatred overnight in France, the country of democracy, ”she breathes, sorry.
She adds: “We are peoples linked by history, by culture or quite simply by blood.
Many Russians have family in Ukraine and vice versa.
This is also my case.
It's like dividing a family.
We are then two peoples who suffer from this conflict.
»
“Their neighbors look askance at them”
Some of his friends, who also live in Nice, have already told him that for a week "their neighbors have been looking askance at them".
“A woman who lives between Russia and France is afraid to say her nationality, to show her passport, says Olia.
The Russian community has nothing to do with it and we are already suffering consequences on our way of life!
»
She adds, “It's unfair.
We too would like the war to end quickly.
But geopolitics is one thing.
Peoples are another;
Why hate Russians?
".
Another of his relatives sent him the window of a Nice bookstore filled with books on Russia or Putin.
“We feel like stars but upside down.
We didn't ask for anything.
This war has been going on for eight years.
We can't take it anymore.
»
“We want peace”
Hélène, president of the association La maison de la Russie, also says that she has received hate messages.
She herself is French and is simply interested in this culture by giving language lessons because she lived in Moscow for twenty-one years.
“I see on the Internet but also from other Russian associations in the area the same message: peace, we want peace, she notes.
For the community, it is very hard.
Everyone is distraught because no one wants this war.
The Russians, as a whole, just want this disaster to stop.
»
These are also the only words that Viktor, who runs a small grocery store selling Russian products with his wife in the Gambetta district, will say.
When we talk to him about the conflict, he shakes his head no and uses his translator to explain that he "can't say anything", that "it's happening elsewhere" even if for him, "it's an incomprehensible situation".
He says he is "very worried" and would like "just peace and that's it".
Nice
"I'm not just afraid for my family, I'm afraid for the whole country", says a Ukrainian who has lived in Nice for two years
Society
Solidarity impulses are multiplying throughout France for Ukraine
War in Ukraine
Vladimir Poutine
Russia
Nice
World
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