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Ukrainian First Lady Olena Zelenska visited the White House on Tuesday, part of a high-profile visit to Washington, as Russia’s war in her country enters its sixth month.
Zelenska arrived at the White House shortly after 1:30 p.m. and was greeted on the South Lawn by President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden. The president presented Zelenska with a bouquet of yellow sunflowers, blue hydrangeas and white orchids – reminiscent of the colors of the Ukrainian flag – and the first lady hugged Zelenska.
The group, which included Ukrainian Ambassador Oksana Markarova, posed for a photo at the South Entrance of the White House, flanked by an American flag and a Ukrainian flag. They did not respond to journalists’ pointed questions about what they would discuss.
Zelenska and Jill Biden had a one-on-one meeting, then held an extended meeting with Linda Thomas-Greenfield, US Ambassador to the United Nations; Isabelle Coleman, Deputy Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID); Victoria Nuland, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs; Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy; and second gentleman Douglas Emhoff.
On this Mother’s Day, my heart goes out to you, First Lady Olena Zelenska, and all the brave and resilient mothers of Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/tCMXCXhgiY
— Jill Biden (@FLOTUS) May 8, 2022
The visit to the White House on Tuesday was not the first meeting between Zelenska and Jill Biden. In May, over Mother’s Day weekend, Jill Biden made an unannounced visit to Ukraine and met with Zelenska in Uzhgorod, a city that borders Slovakia, as well as Ukrainian refugees.
At the start of their one-on-one meeting on Tuesday, Jill Biden recalled the “pain and pain” of the war zone and told Zelenska that her team was working on ways to help the mental health of Ukrainian mothers and children forced to flee their homes.
On Monday, Zelenska met with Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and USAID Administrator Samantha Power to “address the long-term psychosocial consequences of Russia’s war” in Ukraine, according to the White House.
He met with Ukraine’s first lady Olena Zelenska today to discuss the huge humanitarian costs of President Putin’s war. The United States remains committed to helping the people of Ukraine defend themselves from Russia, bring justice, and rebuild their country. pic.twitter.com/r4XuTKHPP7
— Secretary Anthony Blinken (@SecBlinken) July 19, 2022
Earlier on Tuesday, Zelenska visited the new Museum of Victims of Communism in Washington to accept a human rights award on behalf of the people of Ukraine. In remarks at the museum, Zelenska noted that there were three photos of Ukrainian dissidents who were tortured or sent for “challenging the cult of Stalin.” She compared them to some of the atrocities Ukrainians have faced in the past five months as a result of Russia’s invasion.
“Through all this suffering and pain, we are sending a strong warning to war: Remember that the darkest past can be easily defeated,” Zelenska said. “In certain places, the darkness has never gone away. He just figured out how to operate a more advanced weapon and use social media. So, we are not only fighting for our freedom today, we are fighting so that Stalin’s great terror is never repeated anywhere in the civilized world.
The mention of Joseph Stalin was deliberate. In the early 1930s, the Soviet dictator pursued a policy that led to mass starvation in Ukraine. An estimated 4 million people died during this period known as the Famine, or death by starvation.
Deprived of food, Ukrainians remember the famine of Stalin’s time
On Wednesday morning, Zelenska is due to address Congress to provide an update on the security, economic and humanitarian conditions on the ground in Ukraine. The remarks will come less than two months after Congress approved a $40 billion aid package for Ukraine in May that includes $20 billion in military aid, nearly $8 billion in economic aid, nearly $5 billion in global food aid and more than $1 billion in total support for refugees.
In a letter to Democratic colleagues on Tuesday about Zelenska’s upcoming visit, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) highlighted the toll on women and girls that the war in Ukraine has taken, a topic she said is particularly troubling for women in Congress.
“During visits by Ukrainian leaders—from members of parliament to grassroots heroes—many of us have heard horrific stories of the brutal treatment of women and girls by Russian forces,” Pelosi wrote. “We really have enough evidence of abductions and deportations in Russia, rape of women in front of family members and even rape of little girls. … Let me be clear: the rape of children cannot be a weapon of war. This is a war crime!”
At the start of the war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stressed that his family was a primary target for Russian troops. In a rare joint interview with him in May, Zelenska said that she and her two children had not seen Zelensky for 2 1/2 months after the war began, as they took shelter in an undisclosed location apart from him.
“Our family was torn apart, like any other Ukrainian family,” Zelenska said at the time.
Jeff Stein, Mike DeBonis and Dan Lamott contributed to this report.
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