Context: Xi Jinping paid a reciprocal visit to the United States in late September 2026. Donald Trump greeted his Chinese counterpart at the foot of the plane’s stairs. The leaders agreed to mutually reduce tariffs by a total of $30 billion. Citing an official statement from the Chinese government, The Washington Post also reported that the two sides discussed the war in Ukraine. However, no statements were issued following this discussion.
On September 16, 2026, Kirill Kazakov appeared on the program Azaryonok. Napryamuyu and suggested that a country’s safety should be assessed based on whether Chinese students choose to study there. He claimed that they select only the safest locations for their studies. In Ukraine, they faced threats from local residents:
“If you’re not aware, Chinese students tend to be quite particular about choosing where to study abroad. Why? Because they only choose the safest places. Now, Chinese students stopped coming to Ukraine to study long before 2022 because it is an extremely unsafe place. It wasn’t unsafe because bombs are falling there now; it was unsafe because local residents treated Chinese students extremely unsafely. They could be robbed or even killed, perhaps not as often in the case of killings, but robberies, for example, and xenophobic abuse directed at Chinese people, with people shouting ‘slant-eyes’ and things like that. All of this was happening in Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Dnipropetrovsk (Dnipropetrovsk was renamed Dnipro in 2016 — Ed.).”
However, Chinese students were studying in Ukraine before the full-scale war. As of early 2020, the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science reported that approximately 3,500 Chinese citizens were studying in the country. Chinese media also confirmed their presence in Ukraine. Following the outbreak of the full-scale war in 2022, it was reported that there were nearly 3,000 Chinese students in the country and that they were being evacuated back home.
Even during the full-scale war, Chinese citizens continue to pursue their education at Ukrainian universities. In May 2026, Ukraine’s deputy minister of education and science reported that 6,000 Chinese students were enrolled in Ukrainian universities. Since he did not specify how many of them are physically in the country versus studying remotely, this figure does not provide a clear picture of the number of Chinese students currently in Ukraine.
According to Ukrainian sources, Chinese students now make up the largest group of international students, accounting for nearly one-third of the total. Previously, Indian citizens held the top spot.
Meanwhile, some Chinese students have remained in Ukraine, even during the war. Evidence of this can be seen in the Autumn sports games that the Chinese Embassy held for them in Kyiv on August 26, 2025. The event was organized to help students improve their health and relieve stress.
