Germany’s foreign minister in Kiev as Ukraine struggles to repel Russian attacks

The foreign minister of Germany has visited to Kyiv to show support for Ukraine. NATO countries, like Germany, have been slow to send weapons and ammunition, which has made Ukraine vulnerable to recent Russian attacks.

Annalena Baerbock asked for help from other countries to send more air defense systems to Berlin because Russia is attacking Ukraine with missiles, glide bombs, and rockets. Germany gives the second most military help to Ukraine after the United States.

Ukraine’s soldiers don’t have enough people and are trying to stop a strong attack from Russia at the border. This is a very important part of the war, which has been going on for three years.

Germany promised to give Ukraine another US-made Patriot battery, but Ukraine still doesn’t have enough air defenses to protect against the Russian attack.

The Kremlin’s forces have used their advantage in the sky to weaken Ukraine’s power grid. They hope to make Ukrainian people feel tired and disrupt the defense industry.

Baerbock visited a power plant in Ukraine with the Ukrainian Energy Minister. The plant was badly damaged on April 11. At the damaged inside of the plant, employees of Centrenergo, a government company that runs the plant, were still cleaning up debris a few weeks after it was hit.

The Ukraine President said that Russian troops are still attacking the eastern Donetsk and northeastern Kharkiv areas with explosive bombs, causing damage to both military and civilian areas.

“We need air defence to protect our warriors and cities from threats. It’s important to have additional defence systems to make things easier for us,” Zelenskyy said on social media on Monday.

Zelenskyy said Ukraine still has control of the disputed areas, but Russia says it has taken some border villages.

We couldn’t confirm either side’s claims about the fighting on the battlefield on our own.

Baerbock had plans to go to Kharkiv on Tuesday but she had to cancel the trip because it wasn’t safe, according to the German news agency dpa. Nearly 11,000 people have left Kharkiv border areas because of Russia’s attack on May 10th.

A drone attack from Russia damaged many trucks, buses, and other vehicles in Kharkiv city. The regional governor, Oleh Syniehubov, said that over 25 vehicles were damaged. Seven people got hurt, he said.

Ukraine’s military leaders said that the number of Russian attacks in Kharkiv slowed down on Monday, but the fighting still continued.

Russian soldiers are spying and attacking in Ukraine’s Sumy and Chernihiv regions. They are shooting at villages near the border and putting down more mines, said Dmytro Lykhovii, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s military. The front line is about 1,000 kilometers or 620 miles long.

Baerbock was supposed to meet with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba in Kyiv. The German leader, Olaf Scholz, has been saying no to Ukraine’s request for Taurus missiles. These missiles can fly for 500 kilometers and are hard to detect.

The missiles made in Germany and Sweden can travel a long distance and could hit targets far inside Russia if launched from Ukraine. But Berlin doesn’t want to send the missiles because it might make them get involved in the war.

A think tank in Washington said that Ukraine is not allowed to attack Russia, so they can’t stop Russian troops and equipment from getting ready to attack Ukraine.

An object to form a compound is a big problem for the US. Western decisions are making it hard for Ukraine to protect itself from Russian attacks in northern Kharkiv and other places near the border. The Institute for the Study of War said this on Monday.

Baerbock said that Ukraine should join the European Union because of Russia’s illegal war.

Ukraine has done really well and needs to keep making changes to the legal system, fighting corruption, and protecting freedom of the media.

Germany is going to have a meeting to help Ukraine rebuild next month. Rebuilding the country will cost a lot of money, maybe hundreds of billions of dollars.