World News for Students of English

30-06-2026 15:00

The European Commission has proposed extending the temporary protection scheme for Ukrainian refugees until March 2028, but with a major change: excluding military-age Ukrainian men.

This new measure, backed by Kyiv and several EU member states, targets men aged 23 to 60 who cannot legally leave Ukraine due to military obligations under martial law. The decision aims to support Ukraine’s defense needs as the country faces serious shortages in its armed forces. However, the rule will not apply retroactively, which means that Ukrainian men who already hold temporary protection status in the EU will not lose it. To become law, the proposal requires approval by a qualified majority of EU countries.

In a similar move, Denmark announced that military-age Ukrainian men will receive residence permits only if they can prove they are legally exempt from military service. Additionally, the Commission proposed a voluntary return program to support refugees who wish to go home.

Difficult words: excluding (leaving someone or something out, or saying that a specific person or group cannot join a program), martial law (a strict rule controlled by the army instead of the normal police, used when a country is in a big danger or war), retroactively (changing how things worked in the past, or making a new rule apply to things that already happened before), exempt (having a special permission not to do a job or a duty that everyone else is legally forced to do).

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