First lady Jill Biden, left, with Olena Zelenska, the Ukrainian first lady, outside a public school in Uzhhorod, Ukraine, on Sunday, May 8, 2022. (Susan Walsh/Pool via The New York Times).
UZHHOROD, Ukraine – Jill Biden, the first lady, traveled to western Ukraine on an unannounced trip Sunday, the latest show of support from the United States, which in recent weeks has significantly increased military aid to Ukraine and sent others close to the President. Joe Biden to the country.
Jill Biden met Ukraine’s first lady, Olena Zelenska, at a school converted to help refugees who came from other parts of the country to Uzhhorod, a city of 100,000 people a few miles from the border with Slovakia. Zelenska, wife of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has not been seen in public since the Russian invasion began February 24.
“I think it’s important to show the Ukrainian people that this war must stop, and this war is brutal,” Biden told reporters as he sat at a table across from Zelenska, “and that the people of the United States were standing with the people.
Ukraine Biden made his trip on a public day displaying support for Ukraine, with visits from Bono and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and as rescuers searched for survivors from a Russian air strike on a school in the east that officials fear had killed dozens.
In Kyiv, a team of senior American diplomats return to the U.S. Embassy for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine, a move that coincided with Victory on Europe Day. The day was a patchwork of hopes and forebodings. His visit also comes as Western officials brace for the possibility that Russian President Vladimir Putin could use his country’s Victory Day holiday, which falls Monday, as an excuse to intensify attacks on Ukrainian citizens.
Ukrainian officials understand the emotional power of social media and the headlines written by the Western press and have invited various Western officials – and Bono – to the country in recent days.
They reached out days before Biden planned a four-day tour of Eastern Europe to suggest a meeting with Zelenska in Ukraine, according to Michael LaRosa, a spokeswoman for the first woman.
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