Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is set to meet new British Prime Minister Andy Burnham in London on July 27 as he begins a big week of foreign talks amid a rising civilian death toll from Russian air strikes back home.
Zelenskyy will be the first foreign leader hosted by Burnham since he took office one week ago following the resignation of fellow Labour Party member Keir Starmer.
“Britain stands with Ukraine, shoulder to shoulder, and our support remains unwavering,” Burnham said ahead of the visit.
“Russia should be in no doubt of our resolve, and we will not back down until we achieve long-lasting and just peace for Ukraine,” added Burnham, who already spoke with Zelenskyy in a call conducted just hours after assuming office on July 20.
The British prime minister’s Downing Street office said the early meeting of the leaders “illustrates the strength of the relationship between the two nations.”
Burnham and Zelenskyy are scheduled to meet some of the 200 Ukrainian military personnel who have been in Britain the past three weeks participating in a maritime security and counter-mine exercise in preparation for potential future Black Sea missions.
‘Stone Cloak’ System
During that visit, Burnham is expected to announce the sharing of the intellectual property behind Britain’s new “Stone Cloak” electronic warfare system, enabling Ukraine to produce the technology itself.
The jammers, the size of a tablet computer, can be used to prevent Russian air defenses from tracking and targeting drones when attached to the projectiles, officials said.
Downing Street pointed out that the UK’s support for Ukraine has reached 25 billion pounds ($33 billion) since Russia’s full-scale invasion of February 2022, including 16 billion pounds ($21 billion) in direct military assistance.
Following the London visit, Zelenskyy is scheduled to travel to Washington on July 28 for talks with US President Donald Trump.
Zelenskyy is also expected to attend the funeral of US Senator Lindsey Graham, who died earlier this month. The Republican lawmaker was a vocal Ukraine supporter and had travel to Kyiv for meetings with Zelenskyy days before his death.
Kyiv, Other Cities Hit
Meanwhile, the killing continued in the war back home, with the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, coming under a Russian ballistic missile attack on July 26, authorities said, while other regions suffered air strikes during the day that led to at least six deaths.
In the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, a Russian drone struck a supermarket, killing two people and wounding 25, Ukraine’s emergency services said.
“This is deliberate Russian terror that has no military justification,” Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram.
Regional Governor Ivan Fedorov said a glide bomb attack killed one person and wounded six in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhya, which has often been the target of Russian bombardment.
In the frontline city of Slovyansk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, the Naftogaz oil and gas company said two of its employees were killed in a Russian attack while trying to help residents affected by an earlier air strike.
Russia denies targeting civilian areas despite widespread evidence of such attacks that have killed thousands of people since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
