Zelenskyy returns to Ukraine after visiting U.S. and Poland
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine declared Friday that Ukraine was “working toward victory,” buoyed by his hero’s welcome in Washington and a brief visit to Poland in a sprint of diplomacy aimed at thanking his country’s most robust allies and cementing their support.
Zelenskyy was back in Kyiv after his trip, which has boosted morale in a country where millions have been plunged into darkness and cold from Russian missile strikes that have knocked out power as winter sets in.
“I am in my office,” he said in a video posted to his channel on the Telegram social media app early Friday. “We are working toward victory.”
Western allies have pumped aid into Ukraine since Russia’s invasion, and the U.S. House of Representatives gave final approval Friday to nearly $50 billion in assistance to Ukraine.
On Friday, Zelenskyy specifically thanked the Netherlands for a promise of 2.5 billion euros (about $2.7 billion). “We keep working together to increase defense capability, energy stability & restore critical infrastructure,” he posted on Twitter.
In a brief evening address Thursday while en route home, he expressed satisfaction with his landmark visit to Washington, insisting that it had heeded “good results” that “will really help” with Ukraine’s ongoing war effort.
Before returning to Ukraine, Zelenskyy stopped in Poland, where he met for two hours with Polish President Andrzej Duda near the airport in the southeastern city of Rzeszow, a major transit point for Western weapons flowing into neighboring Ukraine and for refugees fleeing Ukraine into Poland.
The location of the meeting, held one day after Zelenskyy met President Joe Biden at the White House, was kept secret for security reasons. Video of his arrival at the Rzeszow airport showed Zelenskyy bounding down the steps of his plane dressed in green cargo pants, heavy boots and a military-style winter jacket.
Duda, in a message posted on Twitter, said that the two leaders had discussed “strategic plans for actions and cooperation in the upcoming 2023,” reaffirming Poland’s strong support for Ukraine’s efforts to defend itself against Russia’s military.
After weeks of a stalemate along much of the front, Zelenskyy’s high-profile visit to Washington was greeted in Ukraine mostly with pride and hope that the president’s impassioned in-person appeals would keep American weapons and financial support flowing.
Dmitry Peskov, President Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, said — as the Kremlin has argued before — that the trip showcased the United States’ commitment to fighting Russia “to the last Ukrainian.”
Although Zelenskyy’s visit to Washington ended with promises of billions more in U.S. support, it did not fulfill some of the more critical requests on his weapons wish list: American battle tanks, fighter jets and long-range precision missiles.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.