sleeper train, emergency shelters, intelligence agents… A surprise visit under high security

A trio for Ukraine. Emmanuel Macron went to kyiv for the first time since the start of the Russian attack in Ukraine on Thursday June 16, with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Italian Council President Mario Draghi. A historic trip, organized in the greatest secrecy.

The journey begins in the anonymity of Medyka station in Poland, 500 meters from the border with Ukraine. A sleeper train chartered by Ukraine, parked next to convoys of goods, awaits heads of state. A missile strike, an attack by a pro-Russian group or sabotage on the route of the convoy are the main threats. To avoid any risk of power cuts on the railway, a diesel locomotive was added to the engine that pulls the train.

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Around 11 p.m. Wednesday, the leaders and their teams reached the quay, covered with weeds. The flight attendants are waiting for the three delegations, each of which has four carriages, with small boxes flocked with the French, German and Italian flags. Everywhere, police are lined up. Shortly after boarding, the three heads of state meet in the lounge area of ​​the French car. To get there, Mario Draghi crosses the corridor of the car reserved for journalists. The scene is immortalized by the photographers. The clock then displays 00:54, the discussion will last up to 2 hours.

A hundred intelligence agents from the three countries are on board, writes the Corriere della Sera (in Italian), as well as diplomats and journalists. Some 300 Ukrainian soldiers are also providing security for the convoy. Emmanuel Macron evokes “an important moment” when he got off the train in kyiv, after ten hours of travel. The leaders are greeted by their ambassadors and Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk. Shortly after, the anti-aircraft siren sounded for the first time that day. It is then the turn of Romanian President Klaus Iohannis to arrive at the station, to join his counterparts.

The quartet takes the direction of Irpin, a town 80% destroyed, located 25 kilometers north of kyiv. Objective for Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz? Show full support for Ukraine, where we no longer hide a certain disappointment in their place. The French leader has been criticized for saying he shouldn’t “humiliate” Russia. Olaf Scholz embodies a Germany to which kyiv reproaches the insufficiency of its arms deliveries. “Today, Ukraine must be able to resist and winclaims Emmanuel Macron. We stand with Ukrainian men and women without ambiguity.”

The four leaders walk past battle-destroyed buildings and a charred car. They also watch a video, then photographs showing the horrors of war, displayed on easels. Security is ubiquitous. Ten days earlier, French police officers had arrived on the spot, specifies France Inter, in order to identify shelters and “extraction routes” for each visit. In Irpin, they had notably spotted cellars and basements of devastated buildings. The biggest risk: a massive missile attack.

The Ukrainian delegation is led by Oleg Bondar, from the state emergency service, and Oleksiy Kuleba, head of the kyiv regional military administration. The leaders are led to the carcass of a disembowelled and bullet-riddled Hyundai. The driver died with her children. Olaf Scholz is questioned by the press but does not answer. The faces are serious in the face of the scale of the destruction and the crimes committed on the spot. Emmanuel Macron pauses in front of a drawing on a wall, accompanied by the message: “Make Europe Not War” (“Make Europe, not war”).

Russians “destroyed kindergartens, playgrounds. Everything will be rebuilt”, promises Mario Draghi at the end of this visit. 750 kilometers away, the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev mocks the visitors of the day, qualified “lovers of frogs, liver sausages and macaroni” and accused of indulging in “horilka”a local alcohol.

The four European leaders then go to the Marinsky Palace in kyiv where they are received by Volodymyr Zelensky, dressed in his now usual khaki t-shirt. It is finally the opportunity for Emmanuel Macron to talk in the flesh with his Ukrainian counterpart, after the long hours spent on the telephone in recent months. During the press conference, which was broadcast later on the television channels for security reasons, the journalists were deprived of their mobile phones, again to avoid any security risk. The tension is great; the anti-aircraft siren sounded again during the talks.

During this exchange, Emmanuel Macron announced the delivery of six Caesar guns, in addition to the twelve already delivered. The four European leaders are also calling for granting the “immediate candidate status” to the EU for Ukraine. They will be heard the next day by the European Commission. Emmanuel Macron ends his speech by declaiming a passage from the anthem of Ukraine, in Ukrainian: “Ukraine is not dead!” And ends his visit with a meeting with the French gendarmes deployed in Boutcha, as part of the investigations into the war crimes attributed to the Russian forces.

On the way back, Emmanuel Macron, Olaf Scholz and Mario Draghi meet to exchange their impressions of the visit. They arrive Friday morning in Przemysl (Poland) after this new night in the train, towed by a “VLIO-1310”, Russian locomotive. An hour before arriving at the Polish border, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi joined the French President for a bilateral meeting. Questioned by AFP after the trip, one of the security officers did not hide his relief: “Everything went very well.”

“I want to send a message of support to the Ukrainians. The coming weeks, we know, will be very difficult.”

Bodies on the ground, cities destroyed… During his visit to Ukraine, a country ravaged by war, Emmanuel Macron responded to @MohamedBouhafsi ⬇️#ThisYou pic.twitter.com/sWDlPj3vHp

— C to you (@cavousf5) June 16, 2022