Published by Jessica Weisman-Pitts
Posted on April 13, 2022
VILNIUS/WARSAW (Reuters) -The presidents of Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia arrived in Kyiv on Wednesday to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, adding to a procession of European leaders pledging backing for Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.
European politicians have flocked by train to the Ukrainian capital since Russian forces withdrew from the country’s north in the face of strong Ukrainian resistance earlier this month.
“Heading to Kyiv with a strong message of political support and military assistance,” Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda tweeted on Wednesday, along with a picture of the presidents next to a train.
The meeting was to focus on ways to assist civilians and the military in Ukraine, said a spokesperson for Estonian President Alar Karis, as well as with investigations into allegations of Russian war crimes which Moscow has denied.
Before meeting Zelenskiy, the four presidents visited Borodyanka, 60 km (37 miles) northwest of Kyiv, which the Ukrainian president earlier deemed “significantly more dreadful” than nearby Bucha with respect to suspected killings of civilians when both were under Russian occupation.
“It’s difficult to express in words what we saw there, and how cruel is this (Russian) regime. I just cannot compare it even with Nazis, I think it’s worse than Nazis,” Nauseda said in video footage from Borodyanka shared by his office.
“There were whole families murdered and then buried on the spot, there were infants raped. Hate and beastliness came out. These were not humans (who did it), they were a mistake of nature. This terrible war must be stopped,” he added, standing in front of burned-out residential highrises.
“The world must understand – there is no time for consideration, no time for diplomatic twists and turns. The civilised world must take immediate action to stop the aggressor,” Nauseda added.
Russia has denied that its forces targeted civilians and has said Ukrainian and Western allegations of war crimes are fabricated.
The four presidents’ visit came a day after U.S. President Joe Biden said Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine amounted to genocide, while Russian President Vladimir Putin promised Moscow would “rhythmically and calmly” continue its operation and achieve its goals.
Putin sent his troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24 on what he calls a “special military operation” to demilitarise and “denazify” the country. Ukraine and the West say Putin launched an unprovoked war of aggression.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed “irritation” after the country’s President Frank-Walter Steinmeier cancelled a visit to Kyiv at the same time “to send a strong signal of European solidarity with Ukraine”. Scholz said Kyiv did not want Steinmeier to visit.
Germany’s Bild newspaper reported that Zelenskiy had rejected Steinmeier’s plans to visit due to his close relations with Russia in recent years and his support for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline designed to double the flow of Russian gas to Germany. Nord Stream 2 has since been suspended.
A Ukrainian official subsequently denied that Zelenskiy had rejected the offer of a visit from Steinmeier.
(Reporting by Pawel Florkiewicz and Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk in Warsaw and Andrius Sytas in Vilnius; Writing by Andrius Sytas; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
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