German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock has visited the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, close to the front lines, becoming the first German Cabinet member to see the war-scarred area first-hand.
She was accompanied on the unannounced trip by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and Ukrainian Ambassador to Germany Oleksii Makeiev.
Foreign officials usually stick close to the capital, Kiev.
Kharkiv is a city of more than 1 million people that is a just few dozen kilometres south of the Russian border. It has been subject to recent Russian attacks.
Baerbock described her third war-time visit to the country as a show of solidarity. She promised more German humanitarian aid – including generators, fuel and blankets – as well as “further arms deliveries.”
She visited just days after the German government’s decision to supply Marder infantry fighting vehicles, which Ukraine had long demanded. Kiev is also urging the delivery of main battle tanks, but so far Berlin has denied the request.
Baerbock also said it was important to her “that even in this winter of war we do not lose sight of Ukraine’s place in our European family.”
Berlin wants to help Ukraine, which applied last year for European Union membership, make progress in strengthening the rule of law, fighting corruption, as well as aligning with EU standards, she said.
Tuesday’s journey, which included a stop at a children’s hospital and a visit to the heavily damaged north-eastern district of Saltivka, was kept secret for security reasons until her departure from Kharkiv.
With airspace over Ukraine still closed, Baerbock travelled to Kiev on an overnight train from Poland. From there, together with Kuleba, she took a regularly scheduled train to Kharkiv in the morning.
In May, Baerbock was the first German Cabinet member to visit Ukraine since the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022. At that time she visited the city of Bucha, near Kiev, which was the scene of alleged atrocities by Russian troops before they withdrew.
After being welcomed by regional Governor Oleh Synyehubov and Mayor Ihor Terekhov at the train station in Kharkiv on Tuesday, Baerbock first visited a destroyed transformer station that has been attacked 15 times, one of the employees told her.
Later, at Kharkiv City Children’s Hospital 16, the minister met patients and their parents. Among the gifts she brought were crayons and powerbanks, as electricity often fails due to the attacks.
Kharkiv is one of the most war-battered cities in Ukraine. Artillery and rocket attacks have damaged more than 8,000 houses, according to the city administration. In the Saltivka district, which Baerbock visited, almost every house has suffered damage.
