Friedrich Merz begins unannounced Kyiv visit as Russia continues strikes on Ukraine’s capital – Europe live

Moscow struck city’s North Bridge this morning, around 20-minutes drive away from the station where the German chancellor arrived

Merz has met Ukraine’s President Voldymyr Zelenskyy at the main war memorial on the Maidan in Kyiv.

Both men lay tributes at the central site, which features thousands of Ukrainian flags and framed portraits of the soldiers who’ve been killed in the war that’s gone on for more than four-and-a-half years.

Some pictures from the scene just now:

The North Bridge – one of several connecting central historic Kyiv to the residential suburbs across the Dnipro river -was struck not long after the German chancellor’s arrival in the Ukrainian capital.