During a visit to Bucha on Friday, where medical examiners began retrieving bodies from a mass grave, Von der Leyen looked visibly moved by what she saw in the northwestern city of Kiev, where Ukrainian officials say hundreds of civilians were killed by Russians. . Russia has denied that it targeted civilians and said it was a “monstrous falsification” of claims that Russian forces had executed civilians in Bukha while occupying the city. As EU officials were due to arrive in Kyiv, at least 50 people were killed and many more wounded in a rocket attack on a civilian train station that escaped the threat of a major Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine. In a press conference, Von der Leyen condemned what she called the “cynical behavior” of those who wrote “for our children” on the weapons found near the scene. Saying that the EU could never respond to Ukraine’s sacrifice, von der Leyen offered it a quicker start in its bid to join the bloc. Handing over to the president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, a questionnaire that will be the starting point for a decision on accession, he said: “It will not be as usual for years to form this opinion, but I think it is a matter of weeks.” Zelensky said in the same press conference that he will return with answers in a week. “Russia will be in economic, financial and technological disintegration, while Ukraine is moving towards a European future, I see that,” Von der Leyen said. Earlier in the day, he told reporters: “The unthinkable happened here. We saw the hard face of Putin’s army. “We saw the recklessness and coldness with which they have taken over the city.” Von der Leyen’s trip to Kyiv was intended to provide Zelenskiy with moral and financial support. He promised to support Ukraine “coming out of the war as a democracy”, which he said would help the European Union and other donors. Josep Borrell, a senior EU diplomat, said he hoped the EU could allocate an additional 500m euros (20 420m) to Ukraine for arms purchases in a few days. Zelensky urged Brussels to do more to punish Russia, including a ban on Russian oil and gas purchases, and called on the EU to accept Ukraine as a full member. Earlier, Borrell said oil sanctions were “a big elephant in the room”, with some concerns that a move to cut Russian crude could push up prices that would be painful for European economies. He said the decision on exports would be taken on Monday in Brussels.
