Photo: IRPIN MAYORS OFFICE/AP/PICTURE ALLIANCE / Deutsche Welle
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau visited on Sunday (08 .05.2022) the city of Irpin, near kyiv, devastated by fighting and occupied by Russian troops in March, announced the mayor of the city.
“He came to Irpin to see with his own eyes all the horrors that the Russian occupiers did to our city,” wrote Oleksander Markushin on Telegram, accompanying his message with photos of Trudeau in the destroyed city. Trudeau’s visit to Ukraine had not been announced.
“The Prime Minister is in Ukraine to meet with President (Volodimir) Zelensky and reaffirm our unwavering support for the Ukrainian people,” his office said.
Today, @VicePMduCanada Freeland, @CanadaFP Minister Joly, and PM Trudeau are in Ukraine. While in Kyiv, they announced new measures and investments to further support Ukraine. Get the details here: https://t.co/8tsi3zKj6m
—CanadianPM (@CanadianPM) May 8, 2022
Markushin stated that “sincerely thanked” the prime minister for “Canada’s support for Ukraine today” and added that “we believe in continued cooperation between our countries in rebuilding Ukrainian cities after our victory.”
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For his part, Trudeau stated that “it is clear that Vladimir Putin is responsible for heinous war crimes”, in a press conference with the Ukrainian leader, assuring that “there must be accountability” and that he himself he was a “first-hand witness to the brutality of Russia’s illegal war.”
Irpin, on the northwestern outskirts of kyiv, was the scene of heavy fighting between Russians and Ukrainians in the first days of the Russian invasion in late February. The Russian Army quickly took control of the city, which had a population of 60.000 inhabitants before the war, and occupied it throughout the month of March.
Since then, kyiv has accused Russian forces of having committed massacres there – as in the neighboring city of Bucha – after dozens of bodies in civilian clothes were found in these towns, occupied and then abandoned by the Russian Armed Forces.
ama (afp, reuters, ctv)