Status: 08.05.2022 21:22
Some unexpected celebrities visited Ukraine today. Canada’s Prime Minister Trudeau traveled to Kyiv, the US First Lady met the Ukrainian President’s wife. There was also a surprise concert.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has traveled to Ukraine unannounced. Trudeau visited the city of Irpin in the greater Kyiv area and then met his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Canadian government confirmed. With his visit, the Canadian prime minister wanted to “reaffirm Canada’s unwavering support for the Ukrainian people,” it said.
Trudeau said Canada will continue to supply arms and military equipment to Ukraine. In addition, his country will impose new sanctions on Russia. He also announced that he would suspend all trade tariffs on Canadian products for a year.
“I just had the honor of speaking with the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau,” Irpin Mayor Olexander Markushin said on his Facebook page. “He came to Irpin to see with his own eyes all the horrors that the Russian occupiers have done to our city.”
The region around the capital Kyiv – including the suburb of Irpin – was occupied by Russian troops for weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine at the end of February. Since the beginning of April, after their withdrawal, the bodies of hundreds of civilians have been found, for whose deaths Ukraine blames Russia.
Jill Biden visits Ukraine’s first lady
US First Lady Jill Biden also made an unannounced visit to Ukraine. At a school used as a shelter for internally displaced persons in the city of Uzhgorod, Biden met with Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska, her spokesman said. According to a US official, this was the first public appearance by the wife of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy since Russia’s war of aggression began on February 24.
It was important to her to travel to Ukraine on Mother’s Day, Biden told journalists. “I felt it was important to show the Ukrainians that this war must stop, that this war is brutal, and that the United States stands with the Ukrainian people.”
US President Joe Biden’s wife is currently on a multi-day visit to Eastern Europe. On Friday she visited US soldiers in Romania and yesterday she met Ukrainian refugees in the country. Today she visited Slovakia in addition to Ukraine.
Bono gives concert in Kiev subway station
Meanwhile, musicians from the Irish rock band U2 made a surprise appearance in a subway station in Kyiv that was used as an air raid shelter. Frontman Bono and guitarist “The Edge” performed the band’s classics like the song “Stand By Me”, as seen in videos from Ukrainian media. “President Volodymyr Zelenskyy invited us to play in Kyiv and show our solidarity with the people of Ukraine and we did,” the two musicians wrote on the band’s official Twitter account.
“People in Ukraine are not only fighting for their own freedom, but for all of us who love freedom,” Bono said at the concert, according to Irish broadcaster RTE. The Unian news agency wrote that the Irish musician’s visit was unexpected. Taras Topolja from the Ukrainian band Antytila is said to have performed with him.
Bono from the band U2 at the concert in a subway station in Kyiv.
Image: EPA
The U2 management initially gave no further information about the performance. About a week ago, US actress Angelina Jolie surprisingly made a solidarity visit to the western Ukrainian city of Lviv and met injured children in a hospital there.