(Kyiv) New British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced new military aid, including anti-aircraft aid, on Saturday in Kyiv, assuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of his support “until Ukraine wins” as a first train linked the capital in Kherson.
“We will stay by your side until Ukraine has won the peace and security it needs and deserves,” declared in Kyiv alongside Ukrainian President Mr. Sunak, who came on a surprise visit to the first time since taking office at the end of October.
Mr. Zelensky welcomed this “meaningful and useful visit for both countries”. “With friends like you by our side, we have confidence in our victory,” he tweeted afterwards. The war in Ukraine has been going on for almost nine months, since the Russian invasion on February 24.
Mr Sunak announced new military aid amounting to 50 million pounds ($79.48 million) and humanitarian aid of 16 million pounds ($25.34 million).
Military aid includes ‘125 anti-aircraft guns and technology to counter deadly drones supplied by Iran [à Moscou]including dozens of radars and electronic anti-drone equipment,” according to a statement from Downing Street.
In Kherson, southern Ukraine, after eight months of Russian occupation, the rail link with Kyiv was reopened exactly one week after the Russian withdrawal, allowing families to reunite.
Svytlana Dosenko fights back tears while waiting for her only son, whom she hasn’t seen since the start of the war. “I only have him,” she exclaims. Her husband died of COVID-19 two days after the conflict began. The electricity had been cut at the hospital where he was on a ventilator.
The reopening of the line should also make it possible to supply Kherson, which desperately needs humanitarian aid. By withdrawing, the Russians destroyed critical infrastructure, leaving the city without water or electricity as a harsh winter set in.
Help civilians
The Ukrainian presidency announced that Andriï Yermak, chief of staff of Mr. Zelensky, had met Isabelle Dumont, adviser to the French presidency, in particular to discuss preparations for the conference scheduled for Paris on December 13 on reconstruction and aid to Ukrainian civilians.
On Friday, Kyiv called on the European Union for “additional support” to get through the winter as nearly half of its energy infrastructure has been “disabled” by massive Russian strikes since early October.
Spain announced on Saturday the dispatch of 14 new electric generators, adding to the five announced on October 19, as well as 30 additional ambulances and police reinforcements to help authorities investigate possible war crimes.
Many Ukrainians have little or no electricity and are without hot water as the first snow of winter fell across the country on Thursday.
Moscow blames the power cuts and their impact on civilians on Kyiv’s refusal to negotiate rather than Russian missile attacks. Kyiv counters that Moscow is not really interested in peace talks and said on Friday evening that the Kremlin “is looking for[ait] henceforth a short truce, a respite to regain strength”.
1991 borders
“Peace will only come after we have destroyed the Russian army in Ukraine and reached the 1991 borders,” Yermak said on Saturday. “Only then will peace be possible.”
These borders are those of independent Ukraine at the fall of the USSR, which include Crimea.
For their part, the leaders of Asia-Pacific affirmed that they “for the most part” condemned the war in Ukraine, in the final declaration of the summit of the APEC, forum of economic cooperation for the region, taking up the formulation of the G20 summit in Indonesia earlier in the week.
Since the start of the war, 437 children have been killed in Ukraine and more than 837 injured, Ukrainian authorities said on Saturday.
The UN released a report this week that prisoners of war on both sides had been subjected to torture and ill-treatment.
On Saturday, the Ukrainian army said it was verifying the authenticity of videos which Moscow said proved that Kyiv executed more than ten Russian soldiers who had surrendered.
Russia on Friday accused Ukraine of having committed a “war crime”, the day after Ukrainian accusations of large-scale torture by Russian forces in Kherson. The UN said it is reviewing these videos.
After the recapture of part of the Kherson region by the Ukrainian army last week, the lines are finally moving to the south.
Well behind the front, in the Crimean peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014, the Russian army is carrying out fortification work: it is a question of “guaranteeing the safety of the Crimeans”, assured Sergueï Aksionov, governor installed by Moscow.