UN chief Guterres visits bombed Kiev suburbs

UN Secretary, General António Guterres visited several destroyed suburbs of Kiev as he attempted to help broker a peaceful solution to the war in Ukraine.

Speaking on Thursday in the area of Borodyanka, just north-west of the Ukrainian capital, he said “I am imagining my family in one of these houses, which are now destroyed and blackened. And I see my granddaughters flee in panic.’’

He said that war was unacceptable in the 21st century.

Guterres will meet Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and President Volodymyr Zelensky later on Thursday.

The pressure had been rising on Guterres to assume a more active role in resolving the conflict.

According to the UN, Putin agreed for the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross to participate in an evacuation of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, where hundreds of civilians are currently trapped and besieged.