Ukraine railway chief reveals how EU leaders got in and out of Kyiv in 24 hours

Despite the danger, Paralympic team returned to Ukraine 5:57 (CNN) — The head of the Ukrainian Railways said that the Polish, Czech and Slovenian prime ministers, who traveled by train to meet President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on Tuesday , took a “strong step” to show support for their war-torn country, even though it was “naive”. “That was really important to us, even if it was naive,” Oleksandr Kamyshin told CNN on Wednesday. Kamyshin, the top executive of the national rail system, called the move naive because the European Union leaders’ delegation announced their travel plans while still on their way to the capital. Kyiv has been the victim of a series of Russian airstrikes that have hit residential areas in recent days, including several apartment blocks, prompting a 35-hour curfew that began Tuesday night. Ukraine’s rail system is not immune to these bombings. But on Tuesday morning, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki announced that he, along with Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša and Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, were on their way to Kyiv. “I was keeping her secret, but when I saw something posted online, I was shocked. I didn’t understand that,” Kamyshin told CNN. Along the way, Morawiecki wrote in a Facebook post: “It is our duty to be where history is made. Because it is not about us, it is about the future of our children who deserve to live in a world free of tyranny.” Fiala also tweeted that the “purpose of the visit is to confirm the unequivocal support of the entire European Union for Ukraine’s sovereignty and independence.” From left to right: Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, Polish Deputy Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński and Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala study a map of Ukraine at an undisclosed location on Tuesday. Security concerns have been on the mind of the 37-year-old railway executive since the war began. Kamyshin and his top deputies have spent the last three weeks touring the country, managing the railway’s 321,000 employees and some 1,450 moving stations. He believes that railway management is a target for Russian bombs, so staying on the move almost constantly is a matter of personal safety. According to Kamyshin, it was the prime ministers’ idea to travel to Kyiv by train, believing it to be the safest means of transportation. He agreed, even though a train station in Zaporizhia was hit Wednesday morning by a Russian bomb shortly after his visit, leaving a crater-sized hole in the train tracks and damaging the train station. . “Any smart person would choose the train over a car these days,” he said. “Even with bombing everywhere, stations and trains are the safest places in the country right now.” Passengers board a train in Lviv, Ukraine, on March 15. Kamyshin said that the delegation traveled on a special train with four of the railway’s newest sleeping cars. The only other passengers were part of the delegation or security. “It was a regular, normal train, with normal cars,” he said. “So [la ruta de la delegación] it was no more special than the others… It was the same route normal passengers take, too.” The trip took about eight or nine hours, he said. The leaders spent a few hours with Zelensky and his team before taking an overnight train. back to Poland.”For me, it is the best assessment of the railways if the foreign prime ministers chose the railways instead of a car or a helicopter, or any other option,” he said.