WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden welcomed Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky to the White House on an unannounced visit on Wednesday with renewed assurances of US support and “admiration for resisting” Moscow.

“Thank you first of all,” Zelensky told the US president. “It’s a great honour to be here.”

The meeting marks a high point in ties between Ukraine and its most important ally, putting the spotlight on a relationship strengthened by Russia’s invasion, but not without some friction along the way.

The visit, which is Zelensky’s first trip outside Ukraine since the war started in February, underscores the trust between the two countries with a White House meeting, a visit to Congress and a focus on more weapons for Kyiv.

It’s a relationship that hasn’t been without irritation, despite the strong military and diplomatic support that the United States has given to Ukraine since Russia invaded it on Feb 24.

“Friction is inevitable even between close allies in wartime,” said International Crisis Group UN Director Richard Gowan.

“The US and UK had huge rows over how to fight the Second World War. So I don’t think we should necessarily let day-to-day friction obscure how much help the US has given Ukraine,” Gowan said.

Tension between the two leaders has been on display at several key moments over the past year.

Most recently Biden disputed Zelensky’s comment that missiles which landed in Poland last month were not of Ukrainian origin, bluntly telling reporters: “That’s not the evidence.”

And as the United States warned in January that Moscow was amassing tens of thousands of troops to invade, Zelensky accused Washington and the media of fuelling panic that weighed on the economy while there were “no tanks in the streets”.

A month later Russia invaded Ukraine.

Western powers have since stepped up to supply Ukraine with weapons and aid, taken in millions of refugees and inflicted severe sanctions on Russia. But Zelensky kept pushing for more, including a no-fly zone that was rejected in March by Nato.

“There was a Nato summit, a weak summit, a confused summit, a summit where it was clear that not everyone considers the battle for Europe’s freedom to be the number one goal,” Zelensky said at the time.

Then in June Zelensky praised Nato’s summit in Madrid, which paved the way for Finland and Sweden to join the alliance, but demanded more military support and an even tougher stance on Russia.

“We need security guarantees, and you have to find a place for Ukraine in the common security space.”

Nato membership for Ukraine has been a long-running and contentious question. Zelensky has pressed

for the military alliance to admit his country into the group. Ukraine has a promise from Nato dating from 2009, when Biden was vice president under Barack Obama, that it would eventually be given the opportunity to join.

The alliance has yet to move forward on Ukraine’s application, however.

Published in Dawn, December 22nd, 2022