They had plenty of time to move to whatever they prefer - unoccupied territories of Ukraine or legitimate territories of Russia. As far as I know they traveled both ways routinely but returned voluntarily every time.
People are attached to places they grew up, it's their home. Also poor people don't have much mobility. I remember when the war just started and one of the first shocking videos was of a mother with two sons and a dog shelled basically live stream on CNN. The father went at that time to DNR to help his sick mother. He did it out of his choice but he probably wasn't a separatist.
> As far as I know they traveled both ways routinely but returned voluntarily every time.
That's of course per-24-feb open russian invasion of those regions. There's been some people such as visiting their elder relatives during winter holidays and now stuck there.
I wouldn't say for removing ocuppied regions of Ukraine from the list but instead adding aggressor to it.