Mikkel Hørlyck Photography
Conflict photojournalist and visual artist

From Hell's Mouth (2024), Ukraine, Eastern Europe: Ukrainian firefighters and paramedics are transferring a civilian man alive out of the destroyed rubble at residential buildings in Kharkiv, East part of Ukraine, which was hit by a Russian missile. 23 January 2024. During the evening, the firefighters found the man's wife and child dead inside their former home. 11 civilian people died in Kharkiv, approximately 75 people were injured and several residential buildings were destroyed. The capital Kyiv in Ukraine was also hit by Russian missile attacks.

Kharkiv is located approximately 40 kilometers from Russia. The full-scale Russian invasion and war in Ukraine started in February 2022.

Hell's Mouth from the East part of Ukraine 2024: For nearly two years, the full-scale Russian invasion and war in Ukraine has been raging and seems to continue throughout the winter with new plans of winning territories back or gaining new territories. According to UNHCR - The UN Refugee Agency, nearly 3.7 million people in Ukraine are internally displaced in January 2024. 6.3 million refugees from Ukraine were recorded in the world in January 2024.

Missile attacks, rockets from artillery and fights in the trenches are part of daily life at the frontline, also drones hitting military targets. But the Ukrainian people experience being hit from Russian missiles, in larger cities such as Kharkiv and the capital Kyiv. Therefore, the whole country is on constant alert.

This photojournalistic project ‘Hell’s Mouth’ is funded by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark’s Fund 'OpEn' - on information and engagement.

Residential buildings in Kharkiv, East part of Ukraine have been hit by large missiles sent from Russia. Firefighters are extinguishing the fire and cleaning up. They are looking for survivors in the rubble. 23 January 2024. Kharkiv is located approximately 40 kilometers from Russia. 11 civilian people died in Kharkiv, approximately 75 people were injured and several residential buildings were destroyed. The capital Kyiv in Ukraine was also hit by Russian missile attacks.

A man is looking at a crater from a Russian missile attacking the city of Kharkiv in the East part of Ukraine. 23 January 2024. It destroyed several surrounding buildings.

Volodymyr (59) is sitting next to a doctor from Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and receiving treatment, because his blood pressure is high, it needs to be measured. He receives medicine. One of his fingers is frozen.

A large residential building has been hit and attacked by a missile in Kharkiv, East part of Ukraine, by a missile by the Russian military. Two persons (center and right) are looking around for a way up in the apartments. Another is carrying a large bag, and one from the Ukrainian military is searching the area for e.g. shrapnel from the missile.

11 civilian people died in Kharkiv, approximately 75 people were injured and several residential buildings were destroyed. The capital Kyiv in Ukraine was also hit by Russian missile attacks.

Soldiers of 18th Sloviansk Brigade of National Guard of Ukraine are practicing going on top of their tank and down from it, while press officers from Soldiers of 18th Sloviansk Brigade of National Guard of Ukraine are filming them. Photographing and making videos and even interviews with soldiers of Ukraine is very important and plays a vital role in the spirit of the Ukrainian people, of gaining access to knowledge of the condition and wellbeing of the soldiers fighting on the frontline for Ukrainian forces against Russian forces.

Smoke from around a residential building, which was hit by a Russian missile. Kharkiv, East part of Ukraine. 23 January 2024.

Lubov from Ukraine is receiving medicine and having a conversation with a doctor from Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in a clinic in Lyman, East part of Ukraine. Lubov’s blood pressure is high. Many elderly people have a high blood pressure, because of stress from the war. Since the full-scale Russian invasion and war started in February 2022 between Russia and Ukraine, many young people have left the area, and it is almost only the elderly Ukrainian people who remain. They don’t want to leave their homes, because they have lived there their whole life.

A young soldier is being portrayed close to the frontline between Ukrainian forces and Russian forces. January 2024.

A woman walks through the smoke, where residential buildings have been attacked early in the morning from the Russian military by a missile. 23 January 2024. Kharkiv, East part of Ukraine.

A man from Pakistan looks into the camera when relaxing and feeling lucky that he is still alive.

The Mercilessness Of The Sea from The Mediterranean Sea, outside Libya coast 2022-2023: Doctors Without Borders ‘Search and Rescue team’ are sailing in The Mediterranean Sea to find boats in distress with migrants and refugees coming to Europe, mainly from Libya.

The refugees and migrants are from Asia, The Middle East and Africa. The route over The Mediterranean Sea is considered as the most deadliest sea route for migrants and refugees.

Many people coming through and from Libya have experienced torture, being held as a slave in a trafficking warehouse and had no human rights protected. The abuse for many, have been sexual, violent and for long periods.

The leader of the boat ‘Mike’ uses a stick to catch the hands of people in the water. Here he saves the life of man and the rest of the crew on ‘Mike’ gets him onboard of the boat.

Members of the boat ‘Mike’ catch the arm of a man and get him onboard the boat.

People who are refugees and migrants have come onboard the boat ‘Mike’.

During the night, the crew of ‘Mike’ and ‘Orca’ comes to another ship to transfer 44 people, who were saved by the members of the ship ‘Broadway’ who sails chemicals to Misrata in Libya. They come onboard Geo Barents, since the route for ‘Broadway’ is towards Libya, and it is not considered as a safe place for refugees and migrants.

People from the first rescue are sleeping and taking a rest. There were 41 people. 39 men and 2 women. Their first meeting is the day after at 09:45 am.

People from ‘Search and Rescue team’s third rescue gather at the view point to the sea of the deck. The waves are high today.

The leader of the boat ‘Mike’ and two ‘Search and Rescue team’ members helping a man from Africa onboard the boat ‘Mike’. The guy is exhausted and the nurse (right) is taking care of him a minute after.

A member of Doctors Without Borders is caring for a man, who is very tired. The men from Africa come from Sudan (North), Nigeria, Chad, Eritrea, South Sudan, Niger, Ghana and Egypt.

A survivor is looking at The Mediterranean Sea. Since 2015, Doctors Without Borders has helped 87.000 people on The Mediterranean Sea.

A man from Africa takes a rest, while enjoying a bar of food.

A man is looking at the sea.

People from Africa are posing for group photographs by one who has a telephone with him.

Marzyeh Ahmadi (38) and Ali Ahmadi (42) try to comfort their youngest child, Marya Ahmadi. They are on their way back from their 38th escape attempt to Croatia. According to the family, father Ali was beaten and humiliated by the Croatian police, in front of his family, before they were sent back to Bosnia.

Nasiha Qarmish (37) from Palestine is walking away from the Croatian border, with four other families, in flip flops, clutching her sleeping daughter. The Croatian border police took Nasiha’s shoes. The four families are at a loss of what to do.

A group of men attempt, unsuccessfully, to cross a collapsed metal beam between two of the metal factory's buildings. "We are human beings, not animals," is one of the phrases regularly used by refugees and migrants.

Hewad Piroz (23) washes his hair with his companions from Afghanistan. The group has been traveling for five months and has fled the Taliban. They sleep with 100 other refugees and migrants in a large, disused metal factory in the town of Bihać. The landscape is flat, but on the horizon refugees and migrants see their escape route: the mountains to Croatia.

Atefeh Mohseni (10) in front of an abandoned house in Bosanska Bojna, where she sleeps with her family and three other families from Afghanistan. Here, families are constantly replacing each other. Some escape through the Croatian border police into the EU, others find another abandoned house to escape from.

Some try 'The Game' at night, others wait until it’s morning. Barialy Karimi (32) is sitting in bed with his son, Musavar Karimi (8). They have a hard time getting out the door. They usually go out between 8:00-9:00am, but today they don’t have the strength before 11:00am.

Hossin Ghalanbari (28) is a former construction worker in Afghanistan. He helps a family to move their sleeping backs to an abandoned house in Bosanska Bojna.

Atefeh Mohseni (10) lifts her little sister Nazanin Zainab Mohseni (3) and kisses her on the cheek. Nazanin calms down.

Atefeh and Nazanin have experienced 20 failed escape attempts of ‘The Game’ at the Croatian border with their father, Hassan Mohseni (39). They live in an abandoned house in the bordertown Bosanska Bojna in Bosnia-Hercegovina.

Earlier, Atefeh and Nazanin’s mother and brother were with the family. But the family split up to improve their chances of escape. Atefeh and Nazanin’s mother and brother managed to get to a refugee camp in the capital Zagreb of Croatia. “The only thing I think about is reuniting my family. I will never stop crossing the border,” says Hassan Mohseni.

Hassan Mohseni (39) tries to comfort his youngest daughter, Nazanin Zainab Mohseni (3). She suffers from a toothache. In 1979, Hassan flet Afghanistan with his parents. "Poverty, suffering and pain are what I remember from Afghanistan. We could not cope anymore, so we flet to Iran”.

The metal factory in Bihać. "Refugees and migrants all carry a story that is unhappy," says Nataša Omeroviš (47), aid coordinator from IOM.

Arpita Gope (30) hums and wiggles with her infant, Splindora (7 months), who is born on the run, while tears run down her cheek.

Atefeh Mohseni (left) is ten years old, but already an adult. "Yesterday we walked 25 kilometers and then we were sent back by the police," says Atefeh in English.

Helinos Gardi (6) from Afghanistan is standing in the center of the village Nea Kavala. She is on her way with her mother to the local Greek Stathis house to feed his dog. In Greece, Helinos and her mother Sughra Gardi (39) have been waiting in a slow asylum process for three years, without much development and without the prospect of being integrated into Greek society.

According to the NGO SolidarityNow, Greece is facing a huge backlog of legal cases, which makes the country in a worse situation than in the acute migration pressure in 2015. Although it wasn’t the final destination for many, 850,000 refugees and migrants arrived in Greece in 2015.

A Question of Proportionality from Northern Greece 2021: In Nea Kavala refugee camp, almost 1,100 people live in white containers, which are stacked close together behind a concrete wall. They live just one kilometer from the village Nea Kavala in northern Greece, which houses about 130 people.

While refugees and migrants are waiting to receive documents that will allow them to enter a new EU country, they have imperceptibly become part of the local community.

Nea Kavala is a microcosm of the challenges Greece is currently facing: high unemployment, expensive rents and depopulation of rural areas, while thousands of refugees and migrants are waiting in camps, without contributing to society.

The Safi family are on their way home to the Nea Kavala refugee camp from the village center, where they spent Sunday afternoon eating late lunch in the town's small park.

Esan (11) from Afghanistan is walking around behind the Nea Kavala refugee camp with his two friends from Afghanistan. The three boys say that they have been traveling through the same route to Europe: Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey to Greece.

Helinos Gardi (6) is at the local Greek Stathis Evstathiadis home, feeding his dog. 30 days after a refugee receives a residence permit in Greece, the right to food and financial support from the Greek government is lost. Then it's about managing yourself.

Sara Taschik and Sughra Gardi are on their way to Nea Kavala refugee camp. Sara and Sughra met on Lesvos and accompanied each other to the mainland and to the refugee camp in Nea Kavala. They are both from the Central Asian ethnic minority Hazara, which has been persecuted for decades by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

The Serbian way of containing refugees and migrants, makes people want to take illegal routes, such as paying smugglers to help them out of Serbia, towards a new country of EU. Therefore, it is rare to see refugees and migrants in the public now.

Above The Mountains from Northern Serbia 2023: Emotionally tracks from experiences described by refugees and migrants, when I meet them, in various countries. The new environment, the unknown territory, the fear of getting abused, harmed, humiliated and dreams, which can feel like they collapse, when not reaching a goal, are some of the mentally and physically, and even spiritually, challenges, which refugees and migrants describe about their route to Europe.

The migration situation in Serbia is more complex than ever. About 3.000 live in official camps, and thousands of refugees and migrants live outside the camps, in informal settlements, or the woods, close to the borders. For them, the situation is more challenging, as you opt out of help from the official offers, i.a. in a reception center at the International Organization for Migration. Since the refugee flow in the early years, for Europe, in the year 2016, you have had to keep people on the run in a firmer grip, so that you as a country, in the Balkans, can maintain an overview. Now, many who are on the run, and at this time, are in Serbia, with the hope of crossing further into Europe, towards a welfare society, through the border routes of Hungary, Croatia/Bosnia and Romania. The challenge of integration in countries where economic challenges with unemployment rates mean that many refugees and migrants take the journey towards the borders, for the hope of a country with more opportunities and dreams that you want to fulfill. For a few, the journey stops in Serbia, where you then travel to your home country, because the family situation in your home country makes you want to go home and protect your family.

Field in Northern Serbia, at Palić. “Migrants’ destination is the EU,” says Nevena Brajovic from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Belgrade, Serbia. Her colleague follows suit: the reason is simple: there are more options for the individual regarding education and work.

These photographs from ‘Above The Mountains’ are a demonstration of the will and connection, which you have to engage with, to conquer all with goodness, in order to survive, as a refugee and migrant.

Refugees and migrants live unseen in the forests, between the reeds, among bushes, trees and all nature that can hide them, from the Serbian border police. They do that e.g. at the border with Hungary, where there is a steel fence along the entire border between Serbia and Hungary. They try to cross the border, when it is dark. In Hungary, 'pushbacks' is a method they use, with violence, but it does not stop the migration in the area.

These photographs from ‘Above The Mountains’ are a demonstration of the will and connection, which you have to engage with, to conquer all with goodness, in order to survive, as a refugee and migrant.