Ukrainian refugees in Denmark arriving in the future will be distributed differently across the country, with fewer people assigned to municipalities around Copenhagen and larger shares going to parts of Jutland and Funen. The government announced the change on 2 September as several municipalities face growing difficulties finding housing for people displaced by Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Five Copenhagen-area municipalities will receive no new arrivals
Under the new model, Brøndby, Albertslund, Høje-Taastrup, Ishøj and Vallensbæk, all located in Copenhagen’s western suburbs, will become so-called “zero municipalities” and will no longer be assigned newly arrived Ukrainians.
Other municipalities around the capital, including Gladsaxe, Glostrup, Ballerup, Rødovre, Hvidovre and Herlev, will continue receiving displaced people but in considerably smaller numbers.
According to preliminary calculations published by the Ministry of Immigration and Integration, Rødovre and Herlev would each receive seven people for every group of 5,000 Ukrainians distributed nationally. Under the current system, their respective allocations would be 37 and 27. Glostrup’s allocation would fall from 21 to four.
Immigration and Integration Minister (Udlændinge- og integrationsminister) Morten Bødskov said some municipalities were now under considerable pressure because of difficulties finding accommodation, while others had indicated that they could receive more people.
“We are therefore putting together the distribution model in a more balanced way,” he said.
More Ukrainian refugees will be allocated to Jutland and Funen
The redistribution means that a proportionally larger share of future arrivals will be accommodated outside the Copenhagen area.
According to Ritzau, reported by DK Nyt, municipalities expected to receive larger shares include Viborg, Syddjurs, Norddjurs, Favrskov, Varde, Skanderborg and Jammerbugt in Jutland.
On Funen, Faaborg-Midtfyn, Middelfart and Assens are among the municipalities expected to receive proportionally more displaced Ukrainians.
The new formula will work differently depending on the size of the municipality. Municipalities with more than 100,000 residents will continue to receive people largely according to population. For smaller municipalities, the system will instead resemble Denmark’s general refugee distribution model and will take into account the number of non-Western immigrants already living locally.
Municipalities with relatively few non-Western residents can therefore be assigned a larger share, while municipalities with higher proportions can receive fewer or, in some cases, none.
The Danish Immigration Service (Udlændingestyrelsen) will recalculate the municipal quotas once the government formally changes the distribution rules. Allocations will also be calculated in groups of 5,000 arrivals rather than 10,000, reflecting expectations that fewer Ukrainians will enter Denmark in the future.
Municipalities will remain able to make voluntary agreements among themselves to transfer responsibility for displaced people.
Housing remains a problem for Danish municipalities
More than 52,000 Ukrainian refugees currently live in Denmark, according to Local Government Denmark (Kommunernes Landsforening, KL).
KL has welcomed the redistribution but warned that it does not resolve the wider accommodation problem, particularly around Copenhagen and other large cities.
Emil Blücher, chair of KL’s Labour Market and Digitalisation Committee (Arbejdsmarkeds- og Digitaliseringsudvalget), said the measures should relieve some of the pressure but argued that further discussions with the government on housing and accommodation remain necessary.
KL has also offered to help coordinate municipalities willing to receive additional Ukrainians with those where accommodation capacity is particularly strained.
The change therefore marks a shift away from a distribution system based primarily on municipal population. For smaller municipalities, existing demographic composition will now also influence how responsibility is shared, while housing availability remains one of the main practical pressures behind the reform.
Denmark also expects fewer Ukrainians to arrive
The redistribution comes alongside tighter Danish rules governing temporary protection for people displaced from Ukraine.
Denmark introduced a special Ukraine law (Ukrainesærloven) after Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, allowing displaced Ukrainians to obtain temporary residence under simplified rules.
On 27 August, the Danish Parliament (Folketinget) approved a restriction covering people subject to Ukraine’s mobilisation rules. Under the legislation, people who are subject to mobilisation and are not exempt from military service can no longer obtain a new residence permit under the special law. Under current Ukrainian rules, the measure primarily concerns men aged 23 to 60.
The government has separately proposed excluding people coming from Ukrainian regions it considers less affected by the war from access to the special protection scheme.
According to the Ministry of Immigration and Integration, the combined changes are provisionally expected to reduce future arrivals by around 40 percent.
The number of people each municipality ultimately has to accommodate will therefore depend on two simultaneous changes: a smaller expected inflow into Denmark and a new system for dividing those who do arrive. For municipalities facing the most acute housing shortages around Copenhagen, the immediate effect will be substantially fewer new assignments, while more of the reception responsibility shifts towards other parts of the country.
