Ukraine’s Irpin and Bucha have “become a symbol of the unimaginable cruelty of the Russian war,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Thursday after visiting Irpin, a suburb outside Kyiv.
This is Scholz’s first trip to Ukraine since the start of Russia’s invasion.
“The brutal destruction in this city is a memorial — this war must end,” Scholz demanded in a tweet.
Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, who is also visiting Kyiv, tweeted that Romania wants “all Russian perpetrators to be held responsible by the international criminal justice.”
“No words to describe the unimaginable human tragedy and horrible destructions we saw today in Irpin,“ Iohannis wrote.
The three leaders were greeted with air raid sirens in the Ukrainian capital, as Russia continued to strike targets across the country. Local officials said on Thursday that an overnight Russian air-launched rocket strike hit a suburb of the northern Ukrainian city of Sumy, killing four and wounding six.
“We’re here, focused, and we’re about to meet President Zelenskiy now to visit a war site where massacres have been committed, and then to lead the conversations that are scheduled with President Zelenskiy,” Macron added.
Soon after their arrival, the three leaders were pictured visiting Irpin, a commuter town a few miles from Kyiv that was subject to some of the heaviest fighting in the first weeks of Russia’s invasion.
Romania’s president, Klaus Iohannis, who also arrived in Kyiv on Thursday by train is expected to join them for talks with the Ukrainian leader.
The visit comes as complaints grow louder in Kyiv about slow arms deliveries, with one official saying this week that Ukraine had only received 10% of the weapons it had requested from the west.
Scholz has become the main target of complaints, with Ukraine particularly unhappy with Germany’s military aid. The country’s ambassador to Berlin, Andrij Melnyk, told German broadcaster NTV that he expected Scholz to hand over heavy weapons that had been long-promised but not yet delivered.
The first joint visit from the leaders of the three largest EU economies is taking place a week before the EU summit where European leaders are expected to discuss Kyiv’s bid to join the 27-nation bloc.
Macron previously tempered Ukraine’s ambitions to join the EU, saying it could take “decades” for Ukraine to be accepted into the EU.
A survey this week from nine EU member states plus the UK found support for Ukraine remained high, but that preoccupations had shifted to the conflict’s wider economic impacts, further heightening fears in Kyiv that western support for the country would fade as Russia continues to make advances in the east of the country.
Speaking to journalists at the annual St Petersburg international economic forum in Russia on Thursday, Denis Pushilin, the leader of the self-proclaimed republic in Donetsk, said that he hoped the so called “special military operation” would be over by the end of the year, as both sides prepared for a prolonged war of attrition with no short-term end in sight.
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