<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>Almost 330,000 Ukrainian citizens have legal residence in Spain, according to the latest data from the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, which states that 59 percent of these individuals are women, a figure that represents an increase of almost 240 percent since the beginning of the Russian invasion.</strong></h4> According to the latest report from the Permanent Observatory of Immigration (OPI) of the State Secretariat for Migration, a subsidiary of the Ministry, a total of 326,422 Ukrainian nationals had valid residence documents as of June 30, 2025. Therefore, the Ministry continued in a press release, the number of Ukrainians legally residing in Spain has increased by 229,634 people (237.3 percent) since December 31, 2021, shortly before the Russian invasion on February 24, 2022. This figure practically (and significantly) coincides with the number of Ukrainians under temporary protection, which is 234,240, 1,675 more than the previous month. The temporary protection mechanism was activated on March 4, 2022, just a few days after the invasion, and has since been automatically extended for one-year periods. On June 25, 2024, the European Council extended temporary protection from March 4, 2025, to March 4, 2026. Spain is the fourth country in Europe hosting Ukrainian refugees under temporary protection. Furthermore, according to the OPI report, more than 60% of Ukrainians residing in our country are concentrated in just five provinces: Alicante (17%), Madrid (10%), Barcelona (13%), Valencia (10%), and Málaga (10%). If we broaden the focus to the autonomous communities, the Valencian Community leads the figure (94,863), followed by Catalonia (67,978), Andalusia (48,784), and Madrid (44,125). These communities have their own Reception, Care, and Referral Center (CREADE), integrated into the International Protection Reception System in Spain. Women represent 59% of the total number of those with residence permits in our country; specifically, 191,586 are women and 134,836 are men. This majority is especially significant in the working age group, especially between 35 and 44 years of age, where the number of men is almost double. Among those under 16, the gender distribution is fairly balanced, and among the population over 65, there is a significant predominance of women. The female majority is largely explained by the arrival of adult women after the start of the war in Ukraine, although the group already had a majority of women beforehand.
