Sawt Falasteen - Zelensky urges 'stronger' aid from German chancellor candidate Merz

The meeting came a week after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz was in Kyiv and as US President-elect Donald Trump has called for negotiations with Russia.

Merz is the leader of Germany's conservative Christian Democratic Union and has argued in the past that Berlin should send more powerful weaponry to Ukraine.

"We are counting on stronger, more decisive actions from Germany, from you personally. We are counting on it very much," Zelensky said, mentioning Ukraine's request for an invitation to join NATO and for long-range missiles.

Merz has urged Scholz to send Ukraine the long-range Taurus missile system, which could fire deep into Russian territory -- something Scholz has refused to do for fear of escalating the conflict.

"President Zelensky knows our position on Taurus missiles... As it stands today, at the beginning of December 2024, it remains the same," Merz said in Kyiv.

Merz, who arrived by train from Poland in the morning, earlier said on social media: "The war in Ukraine must end as soon as possible. Only if Ukraine can defend itself will Putin enter into negotiations."

Combat has intensified ahead of the inauguration of Trump -- who has repeated that he would end the conflict swiftly, raising fears he could force Kyiv into a deal on Moscow's terms.

Zelensky on Sunday said Kyiv needed an "enduring" peace to protect it from Russia after talks in Paris with Trump, who said he would "probably" reduce aid to Ukraine.

- 'It just can't go on like this' -

But on the ground in eastern Ukraine, the situation remained dire for Kyiv, with Russian forces making steady advances for weeks.

In the snow-blanketed village of Yatskivka in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine, Inna Yurchenko was torn between her own conflicting feelings about the possibility of freezing the fighting.

Outside her shop -- one of the only buildings in the village repaired after being damaged in fighting between Russian and Ukrainian troops in 2022 -- she said negotiations could help prevent further "massive casualties".

But she was also worried that it was unclear how talks would impact the lives of civilians -- and soldiers -- in frontline regions.

"Of course, I'm not excited at the prospect of the conflict being frozen," the 52-year-old told AFP.

But she said that incoming US President Donald Trump and Zelensky "need to do something".

"Some solution has to be found. It just can't go on like this. Our forests have been burned to ashes. People have been killed, have lost their homes or have lost everything."

Russian forces, pushed back from her village in the 2022 offensive, are nearing once again, part of a broader push that has seen the Kremlin's forces gain ground faster than at any time since the beginning of their invasion.

"I'm afraid of what is to come," Yurchenko said.

Ukrainian officials said Russian attacks killed a 91-year-old woman in the village of Stara Mykolayivka in the embattled Donetsk region on Monday, as shelling also wounded four others.

A man was also killed in the southern Kherson region, the local governor Oleksandr Prokudin said.

J.AbuHassan--SF-PST