As noted in the ombudsman's report, domestic sources, both official and unofficial, offer varying estimates of the number of Ukrainian labor migrants who left the country in recent years, ranging from 2 to 7 million people. Nina Karpacheva said that in 2002 Ukrainian citizens most often traveled to Russia (6.1 million), Poland (4.2 million), Hungary (1.8 million), Moldova (1.3 million), Belarus (0.9 million), Slovakia (262,000), Turkey (177,000), Romania (116,000), the Czech Republic (97,000) and Germany (96,000).
According to official data from the Ministry of Labor, in the first half of 2002, 20,617 Ukrainian citizens were temporarily working abroad, of which 20,199 were labor migrants, 227 seasonal workers, 152 hired trainees, and 39 workers under contract agreements. The largest number of Ukrainians temporarily worked in Greece - 7,249, Cyprus - 2,914, Liberia - 2,266, the United Kingdom - 1,287, the United Arab Emirates - 703, Germany - 551, Russia - 543.
According to the ombudsman, official data from the Ministry of Labor do not sufficiently reflect the real picture of labor migration from Ukraine, its scale and geography, Interfax-Ukraine reports. Thus, according to an expert estimate by the Ukrainian embassy in Russia, only in that country in 2002 about 1 million Ukrainian citizens temporarily worked illegally, and "at the seasonal peak this figure reaches 3 million people".
According to expert data from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, more than 2 million Ukrainians are illegally working abroad. According to the Foreign Ministry, up to 300,000 Ukrainian citizens are in Poland, up to 200,000 in Italy, from 100,000 to 200,000 in the Czech Republic, from 140,000 to 150,000 in Portugal, up to 100,000 in Spain, about 35,000 in Turkey, and up to 20,000 in the United States.
Nina Karpacheva believes that it would be more realistic to say that at least 5 million Ukrainian citizens are abroad for work each year, depending on the season. Given that Ukraine has 28 million citizens of working age, it can be concluded that every fifth economically active Ukrainian is currently working abroad, the Ukrainian ombudsman noted.