Poland’s new prime minister visits Ukraine in latest show of foreign support for Kyiv

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk vowed Monday to keep supporting Ukraine against Russia’s nearly 2-year-old invasion, announcing a new military aid package that includes a loan to buy larger weapons and a commitment to find ways to manufacture them together.

Meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv, Tusk said they had reached “an understanding” to resolve through talks any differences between their countries over grain shipments and trucking. Those issues recently soured ties between the neighbors.

Ukraine’s allies have in recent weeks sought to reassure the country that they are committed to its long-term defense against the Kremlin’s forces amid concerns that Western support could be sagging. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and France’s new foreign minister also traveled to Kyiv recently.

Tusk, who returned to power in Poland last month and is keen to show that a change in government won’t bring a change in its policy on Ukraine, also met with his counterpart, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal.

Tusk said that Kyiv was the first foreign capital he has visited since becoming prime minister again. He returned to Polish politics after serving as president of the European Council — one of the European Union’s top jobs.

He framed the war as a wider struggle between Europe and Russia that had repercussions beyond Ukraine, making it a priority for Poland.

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“Today Ukraine is shouldering the security matters of the entire European continent. Today Ukraine is paying the huge price of blood for the values that are fundamental to the free world,” he said. “Poland’s security is also at stake in this struggle.”

Zelensky described the talks as “very productive” and said Poland’s new military aid would include a loan allowing Kyiv to purchase big-ticket weapons. He said that he and Tusk also assessed opportunities for joint arms production, in line with similar discussions with other allies.

Tusk’s visit took place the day after Moscow-installed officials in eastern Ukraine reported that Ukrainian shelling had killed at least 27 people on the outskirts of a Russian-occupied city. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the shelling outside Donetsk a “monstrous terrorist act,” and the Russia-backed local authorities declared a day of mourning.

The Ukrainian military, however, denied that it had anything to do with the attack.

It was not immediately possible to verify either side’s claims.

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Poland, on NATO’s eastern flank, has been one of Ukraine’s strongest allies in its fight to defeat Russia. Warsaw has provided weapons and humanitarian aid, and opened its borders to Ukrainian refugees since Moscow’s troops invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.

But relations soured last year as economic competition from Ukrainian food producers and truckers angered Poles who said their livelihoods were under threat. Polish farmers and truckers blockaded border crossings, causing backups and threatening the flow of some aid going into Ukraine.

Polish farmers complained that imports of Ukrainian foods had caused prices to fall, hurting their incomes, and truckers said they were being undercut by their Ukrainian counterparts. The issue surfaced during the war as Ukrainian ports were blocked and food producers turned to land routes through Europe to get their products to market.

At one point, Poland and some other European nations banned Ukrainian grain imports because of the trade dispute.

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Poland’s farmers and trucks have ended their protests for now, but Tusk is seeking ways of addressing their concerns. He has said that his country wants to help Ukraine economically but not at the expense of Polish businesses. He has suggested that Ukraine needs to better regulate its trucking industry.

Tusk was also scheduled to honor Ukrainian fighters and attend observances of Ukraine’s Day of Unity, which commemorates the merger in 1919 that brought together its eastern and western regions.

As part of the celebration, Zelensky signed a decree that, among other things, instructs the government to preserve the national identity of Ukrainians living in border regions that are now part of Russia, such as Belgorod, Kursk and Briansk. Some of those areas have recently been targeted by Kyiv’s forces.

The decree also aims to establish a center for investigating crimes against Ukrainians on those territories, including forced Russification, political persecution and deportation.

In other developments, Ukraine’s air force said it had intercepted all eight Shahed drones that Russia launched overnight over southern and central regions of Ukraine.

Debris from three drones shot down over the central Dnipropetrovsk region started a fire at an unnamed business, but no casualties were reported.

Elsewhere, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi visited Kharkiv on the third day of his tour of Ukraine. The nation’s second-largest city was among the targets of a Russian missile attack Tuesday that injured 17 civilians.

Later, Grandi visited children at a school that has relocated to the city’s subway system.

Meanwhile, major Ukrainian digital banking platform Monobank said it came under a massive denial-of-service attack by unidentified hackers. The attack was successfully repelled, the bank said, with no major consequences. Monobank is one of Ukraine’s biggest banks.