First Lady of Ukraine Olena Zelenska met with First Lady of the Republic of Korea Kim Keon Hee.
President of the Republic of Korea Yoon Suk Yeol and his wife arrived in Ukraine after participating in the NATO summit in Vilnius (Lithuania).
They began their visit with a trip to Bucha, where, in particular, they saw destroyed infrastructure facilities and the burial places of civilians killed by the Russian military.
"Thank you very much for this visit. Such visits are important for Ukrainians and are evidence of solidarity and support," Zelenska said.
She also thanked President of the Republic of Korea Yoon Suk Yeol for his firm support of the people of Ukraine and the readiness that he expressed to contribute to the successful recovery of our country, which he confirmed at the NATO summit and during his visit to Poland (July 13-14, 2023).
The First Lady of Ukraine discussed with Kim Keon Hee the issue of protecting Ukrainian cultural heritage amid Russian aggression.
"One of the ways to preserve it is digitization, currently being done by the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture and Information Policy. The Republic of Korea is particularly powerful in the digital sphere. I hope we will be able to cooperate in this area as well," Zelenska said.
The presidents' wives visited the Children Rights Protection Center (CRPC), created under a decree of the Head of the Ukrainian State and administered by the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights. The Center opened on June 1, International Children's Day.
The Center has created conditions for interviewing children who witnessed and/or were victims of Russian war crimes, were deported to the territory of the Russian Federation, or to the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. The interview is conducted by a psychologist using the specific Barnahus model so that law enforcement officials do not have to repeatedly question a child and thus not cause additional psychological trauma.
As of July 14, the Children Rights Protection Center conducted a survey of returned children who witnessed war crimes of the Russian Federation, were deported from the temporarily occupied territories to Russia, and/or illegally relocated to the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.
"The main mission of the Center is to restore human (in this case, children's) rights. Restoring safety, respect, attention, and, most importantly, justice, which also means punishment for offenders, no matter how far away they are," Zelenska said.
In addition, the wives of the presidents of Ukraine and the Republic of Korea visited the National Reserve Sophia of Kyiv.
"The thousand-year-old cathedral is one of the very few on our land that survived both the Mongol invasion, and many subsequent invasions and conquerors, the Russian Empire, the Bolsheviks, and the Second World War. And now, with the daily air alerts due to a new invasion – the Russian one – it also remains a place of wisdom and understanding that it is possible to endure. If you get your way," Zelenska said.