Ezra worker with Kiev street children.

Artushenko Anatoliy, Coordinator of Ezra's Children's Work speaks: We felt that the only way out of this situation was to have an orphanage and help the children leave the lives they'd become used to. During the first stage of our work with them we rented apartments and started to live there with them; we became their teachers and even older brothers but according the law we did not have the right to do this. This is why we went to the governmental orphanage and in such a way started to help them. But it also was not enough! Now in Ukraine, particularly in Kiev, there are a lot of orphanages and rehabilitation centers but it is still not enough. There are now about 5,000 kids on the streets in Kiev. Some of them have homes but they go there only to sleep once their drunken parents are also asleep. Some of them are from villages with high unemployment and poverty; some are from orphanages where they've run away from for various reasons. About 25% of the kids are from families where the parents have sold their apartment to buy alcohol or drugs and have become beggars.

Now we are working in a government orphanage. Police bring children there who have committed crimes. There we bath them, treat them for the different venereal and contagious illnesses they have and delouse them. We try to find out their story of how they came to live on the streets etc. In this group there are 10 educators. We find out where their parents are and help these families become whole again. After days and months of consultation and personal meetings some of the children begin to go to church and, if necessary, rehabilitation.