‘No words’: Lithuanian PM visits Ukraine’s devastated Borodianka

 Lithuania’s prime minister on Monday toured the war-shattered Ukrainian town of Borodianka near Kyiv where rescue crews were scouring rubble for the missing after the destruction wrought by Russian forces.

“Today, my visit to Ukraine started in Borodianka. No words could possibly define what I noticed,” premier Ingrida Simonyte wrote on his social media handle.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal uploaded pictures of him showing Simonyte the ruins of bombed-out apartment buildings in the small town some 50 kilometers (30 miles) northwest of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.

“Borodianka is one of the painful wounds on the body of Ukraine,” he wrote in Telegram.

“The legacy of the occupation by the Russian barbarians is terrifying.”

Shmyhal thanked Lithuania for “joining the investigation of war crimes” carried out by the Kremlin’s forces.

“We will bring to justice all those responsible for these atrocities,” he wrote.

Borodianka, which had a population of around 13,000 prior to the war, was occupied by Russian forces for several weeks before their retreat late last month.

Ukrainian rescue workers are still digging through the rubble of bombed-out apartment blocks searching for the missing while relatives wait.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned last week that the destruction in Borodianka was “much more horrific” than the situation uncovered in the nearby town of Bucha.

Violence in the town of Bucha, where authorities say hundreds were killed — including some found with their hands bound — has become a byword for allegations of brutality inflicted under Russian occupation.

Simonite is the latest in a stream of foreign leaders to visit Kyiv since Russian forces were pushed back as the West looks to show its support for Ukraine in the face of Moscow’s onslaught.