The Princess Olga award
President Volodymyr Zelensky awarded Melania Trump the Order of Princess Olga, 1st Class, which is Ukraine’s highest award for women. A presidential decree cited her "significant personal contribution to humanitarian support for Ukraine" as the reason for the honor. This award follows a ceasefire in the Russian-occupied city of Oleshky in the Kherson region, an agreement that allowed the evacuation of several hundred people from a city on the brink of disaster. The White House said Melania Trump "independently initiated engagement between the two warring nations and successfully secured a ceasefire," calling the achievement an unprecedented diplomatic initiative by an American First Lady. While both Russian and Ukrainian sides thanked her for the truce, neither side provided specific details concerning the nature or extent of her involvement. The UN called the deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia a war crime. Ukraine reports that almost 20,000 children have been illegally sent to Russia and Belarus since the full-scale invasion began in 2022. In 2025, Melania Trump said an "open channel of communication" existed with Russian President Vladimir Putin to help reunite displaced Ukrainian children with their families.
Diplomatic meetings in Washington
Melania Trump will host Russian and Ukrainian delegations at the White House this Thursday to discuss the Oleshky ceasefire. The delegation includes Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets, Russian ombudsman Yana Lantratova, Ukrainian MP Davyd Arakhamia, and Russian businessman Kirill Dmitriev, who is close to the Kremlin and has frequently taken part in US-brokered ceasefire talks. Lubinets and Lantratova traveled together into Oleshky last week to facilitate the evacuation mission. Arakhamia, who heads Zelensky’s party in parliament, managed the informal contact between the White House and Moscow during the ceasefire negotiations. Lubinets noted on social media that "there are important meetings ahead" as he traveled to the US. Melania Trump will deliver remarks regarding the Oleshky truce at 11:00 on Thursday. This gathering is unusual because meetings involving such senior representatives are rarely convened through an initiative led by a US First Lady. US envoy Steve Witkoff said that Russian, Ukrainian, and American representatives will meet in Abu Dhabi next week to discuss security agreements. This meeting in Abu Dhabi marks the first trilateral discussion since February.
