Rob Rinder reunited with his Strictly Come Dancing partner’s grandmother after she fled Ukraine and the reunion photos are emotional.
Better known as Judge Rinder, the TV star travelled to Przemyśl in Poland, where many refugees have been fleeing amid attacks from Russia.
He wanted to help his Strictly professional partner Oksana Platero’s grandparents safely cross the border, revealing they narrowly avoided a bomb after it hit their neighbour’s home.
The 43-year-old has since reached both Oksana’s grandmother and auntie after a week of searching, sharing pics of the precious moment he got to embrace them.
He wrote on Twitter: Oksana’s family: Auntie Lidya and Grandma Zoya. We managed to reach them this morning with a wheelchair & some medical supplies. Despite having nearly nothing.. they are ‘grateful for everything’’
The two snaps show Rob with his arm around her relatives and placing tender kisses on their foreheads as they cuddle up to him with tear-stained faces.
There was a lot of love in the replies, praising ‘top man’ Rob for his ‘selfless’ actions.
‘What a wonderful thing to do for others @RobbieRinder. How hard for those heartbroken people to leave their home and country despite the awful war. Wishing you all a safe passage home to the UK,’ wrote one.
Another replied: ‘I can’t believe we are living through this in 2022. How has one man been allowed to do this? It so upsetting to see this, and feel so helpless, but then the people like you , and so many others who do thing like this, proves the world isn’t bad and not all are evil x’
‘It always makes me roll my eyes when people leave Strictly and talk about being friends for life but blimey Robert , you have proved that in the most beautiful and compassionate way possible . You’re a wonderful person and please give those ladies all our love,’ tweeted one follower.
Rob danced with Oksana, 33, on the BBC dance show in 2016 and reached the quarter-final final stage.
The presenter has told The Sun that he felt a ‘personal connection’ to the conflict as Oksana, 33, was ‘going mad with worry for her family,’ who were still living in her native city of Kharkiv as President Putin launched attacks.
She was unable to make the journey herself due to work commitments in the States and, while her mother and 10-year-old brother made it to Hungary, her grandparents, whose ages range from 75 to 95, had been refusing to evacuate their homes.
However, her maternal grandmother Lidiya, 75, and paternal grandparents Zoya, 95, and Vasyliy, 87, finally agreed to make the arduous journey after a close call with the bomb landing next door to them.
The dancer shared that, at that point, they were left with no light, no electricity, and no connection, stressing how cold it gets in Ukraine without heat.
It is not known how Rob tracked down Oksana’s relatives or where they are located but, since her two eldest grandparents being unable to walk, 57-year-old uncle Oleksii, who has a limp, to pull them up six flights of stairs to find shelter on their journey through Ukraine.
Oleksii’s car was requisitioned by the military during their journey and they were forced to seek shelter to sleep in a kindergarten.
The group thankfully made it across the border to Poland despite not having a wheelchair, food or medical supplies, remaining defiant in the face of adversity.
After documenting his trip to Ukraine and meeting many refugees along the way, Rob likened the scenes to those of World War II, when there was a mass exodus of people fleeing Nazi persecution as trains arrived full of refugees trying to get to safety from the conflict.
He has called out UK authorities for not doing more to help Ukrainian refugees, slamming the ‘red tape’ that was holding up allowing refugees to enter.
‘The sad thing is that the British people, with their proud history of welcoming refugees, stand ready to welcome Ukrainians open-armed.
‘Yesterday, ministers officially announced their policy to allow Brits to house displaced people in their own homes, in return for a £350 a month thank you
‘But that will be little more than another noisy virtue signal, unless they put some serious effort into making it not only possible, but easy for people to offer their homes and Ukrainian refugees to accept them,’ he said.
More than 1.5million people have fled their homes in Ukraine since the war began, in one of the largest humanitarian crises of recent times.
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