The wife of Ukrainian President Olena Zelenska held a meeting with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in Washington. This is reported by the Office of the President of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian first lady posted pictures of the meeting on her Facebook and said that she had arrived in the United States at the invitation of Jill Biden - the wife of President Joe Biden. "To see with her own eyes and talk to those who lost their homes and loved ones because of the war, Mrs. Biden visited Ukraine in May. Now it's my turn to speak in the U.S. about the Ukrainian needs in our resistance and fight against the aggressor," said Olena Zelenska, starting the visit.

"Passenger planes are flying peacefully, people are not frightened by sirens and loud noises in the street. It's a strange feeling: in the fifth month of the Russian invasion to be in a country where all this is possible," Zelenskaya wrote of the trip.

Of her meeting with Blinken, she reports, "His position on what is, quote: "a sovereign, independent Ukraine will exist much longer than the ways" remains unchanged."

U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi reported that Zelenska will address the U.S. Congress on July 20.

Olena Zelenska visited the 1932-1933 Holodomor Victims Memorial in Ukraine in downtown Washington, D.C., erected with funding from philanthropists, the Ukrainian government and the Ukrainian diaspora in 2015, and met with representatives of the Ukrainian community in the United States there.

"Visiting this place that resonates so much with our tragic present, where Russia is trying once again to destroy Ukraine, got a real ray of light - a meeting with the Ukrainian community in the United States. These are people who even thousands of kilometers away from their homeland remember who they are, know the language, who have been the first to respond to the Russian attack in a volunteer fashion and rushed to help their homeland and fellow countrymen," Zelenskaya said.

On the first day of her visit, she also met with Samantha Power, head of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

"I was glad to see our great friend, Ms. Samantha, especially in the context of the fact that her agency, USAID, is one of the main partners of Ukraine in the support of people. In particular, we are talking about psychological assistance through our National Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Program. Together we have to give Ukrainians back their potential and strength to live," said the First Lady of Ukraine.

Olena Zelenska also met with participants of the Prosthetics Program, initiated by the Ukrainian House in Washington D.C. and the Ukrainian Embassy in the United States. It was created specifically for Ukrainians who had lost limbs as a result of Russian aggression.

Elena Zelenskaya spoke about the first Ukrainian citizens who took advantage of this assistance - the Stepanenko family from Kramatorsk: "Natalia Stepanenko and her 11-year-old twins Yana and Yaroslav were at the train station in Kramatorsk and were trying to evacuate the very day a Russian missile flew there... Natalia lost a leg, Yana lost both. Now the family is in the U.S. - Natalia is already adjusting to a new prosthesis, and Yana is preparing for prosthetics in the near future."

The First Lady stressed that the program is ongoing. The Ukrainian House and the Embassy are collecting information from the Ministry of Health about the children who have been injured by landmines. Once a medical facility is identified that will take the family to the U.S. and a meeting between Ukrainian and U.S. doctors, transportation and prosthetics take place.

"I believe that together we will give the children back the childhood that the Russians took away from them," Elena Zelenskaya summarized.