The flow of Ukrainian citizens arriving in Belarus from the conflict zone in Donbas decreased this year, but did not stop, despite the Minsk agreements, Sergei Kasinsky, the head of the department on refuges and shelter of the republic's Interior Ministry's citizenship and migration department, said in Minsk on Friday.

"Despite the fact that the Minsk agreements are now in effect, the flow has decreased, but it continues," the Belarusian state-run media quoted Kasinsky as saying.

"There are a total of some 47,000 Ukrainians in our country who have permanent or temporary residence permits," he said.

According to Kasinsky's information, 900 citizens of Ukraine sought protective status in the Belarusian Interior Ministry in 2014, some 1,200 sought such status in 2015 and some 200 sought it in the first quarter of this year.

He recalled that additional protection is provided for a year with the right to extend it if the situation in the country from which the migrant arrived does not change.

"We currently believe the situation has not changed and has not improved so much as to say that we will no longer extend the additional protection to these people," he said.

Kasinsky said some citizens of Ukraine who have arrived in Belarus from the military conflict zones are returning to their homeland, but their number is insignificant.

Kasinsky also said a permanent flow of migrants to Belarus from Syria began in 2013.

"This flow remains. These people are mainly young people who have come to study and do not want to return to their homeland due to the civil war. There are families, including mixed, among the refugees," he said.