Photo: GENYA SAVILOV / AFP / Getty Images
Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky has announced that Two top US officials, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, will visit kyiv on Sunday
, according to CNN.
“I don’t think it’s a secret that the people of the United States are coming to us tomorrow, the secretary of State, Mr. Blinken, and the Secretary of Defense (Lloyd Austin) who will come to us,” Zelensky said at a press conference held in an underground metro station in the Ukrainian capital.
Zelensky also said: “We will wait, when security permits, for the president of the United States to come and speak with us”.
“I think it will”, Zelensky said, adding that it was Biden’s decision and that it would depend on the security situation.
Biden, who previously s suggested he wants to go to Ukraine, he said earlier this month that he was working with his team to determine whether he should send a senior member of his administration to the country.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki reiterated during a Monday press conference that there are no plans for Biden to travel to Ukraine. “That has not changed, our focus remains on providing Ukraine, the Ukrainian government, the Ukrainian leadership, a historic amount of security assistance,” Psaki said.
Psaki said that if an administration official visited Ukraine, the White House would not publicly disclose that information ahead of time, 1240188140 citing security concerns.
The White House and the State Department declined to comment Saturday on Blinken and Austin’s possible trip to Ukraine, according to CNN.
Zelensky’s news conference came after missile strikes killed at least eight people in the port city of Odessa, including a baby, ahead of the upcoming Orthodox Easter, Ukrainian officials said.
A leader of the city of Odessa denounced the attack as “Easter gifts from Putin”, and a video shared on social media showed large plumes of smoke rising from an apartment building.
Ukraine will start Orthodox Easter under curfew after the country’s presidential office prohibit residents of the 24 regions from venturing outdoors at night.
In Mariupol, Ukrainian authorities on Saturday accused Russian forces of attacking the Azovstal steel plant, where many of the city’s remaining defenders take refuge.
Russian President Vladimir Putin publicly ordered his forces on Thursday not to storm the site, but instead to block it.
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Although the president of the European Council said that he “urged to face “cited” Putin to immediately open humanitarian access to what s residents, Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boychenko’s office said Russian forces “thwarted” a planned civilian evacuation effort on Saturday.
With information from CNN, The Washington Post and Europa Press