Eastern leaders make dramatic dash to Kyiv to show EU solidarity

[LVIV] The prime ministers of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia are on their way to the besieged Ukrainian capital to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the first delegation of leaders to travel to Kyiv since Russia launched its invasion almost three weeks ago.

The dramatic intervention comes in coordination with European Union institutions, and will include the announcement of a further support package for Ukraine, according to the Polish government.

The premiers - Poland's Mateusz Morawiecki, Petr Fiala of the Czech Republic, and Janez Jansa of Slovenia - are all travelling by train. Nato and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe were given advance notice of the route as a safety precaution, according to Morawiecki's chief aide, Michal Dworczyk.

"We are going to Kyiv to show Ukrainians our solidarity," Morawiecki said in a Facebook post on Tuesday. "At such watershed times for the world, it is our duty to be where history is forged."

Zelenskiy has held multiple phone calls with fellow leaders and appeared in several video links with US and other lawmakers, but this will be his first in-person meeting with visiting dignitaries since the war began.

As well as showing solidarity, the trip may go some way to help quash speculation in Russian media that the Ukrainian leader fled the military advance ordered by President Vladimir Putin.

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The delegation will arrive in a city under artillery and missile siege, with Ukrainian forces reporting several residential buildings shelled overnight. As the fighting escalates, Kyiv's mayor, Vitali Klitschko, imposed a 48-hour curfew from 8 pm local time on Tuesday.

"Today is a difficult and dangerous moment," he said.

The delegation comprises officials from some of the front line states that have shouldered the bulk of the people fleeing the war: Poland alone has taken in some 1.8 million refugees. All are Nato members and among the most vocal supporters of Ukraine's accession to the 27-nation EU.

Speaking to reports in Paris, Russian Ambassador Alexey Meshkov said the visit to Kiyv won't help any peace efforts because the participating leaders' stance is "well known."

The leaders are traveling as representatives of the European Council, and will meet with Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal as well as Zelenskiy. The trip was coordinated with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU President Charles Michel.

The visiting premiers will express "the unequivocal support of the entire European Union for the sovereignty and independence of Ukraine," Fiala said on Facebook.

In a curious twist, they are being accompanied by Poland's deputy prime minister and defacto leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, whose twin brother Lech died in 2010 in an air crash en route to the western Russian city of Smolensk in his capacity as then-Polish president.

In his Facebook post, Morawiecki referenced a trip that Lech Kaczynski made to Tbilisi in 2008 to join a rally for independence days after Russia invaded Georgia. "We know very well that today Georgia, tomorrow Ukraine, the day after tomorrow the Baltic states, and then maybe it's time for my country, for Poland," Morawiecki quoted Kaczynski as saying. BLOOMBERG