The journey is risky, the means of transport unusual.

The heads of government of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia traveled by train to Kyiv on Tuesday to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

In this way they want to signal their support for Ukraine's freedom struggle and present a package of concrete aid for the country attacked by Russia.

In the evening, Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki reports the arrival.

"Here, in war-torn Kyiv, history is being made," he wrote on Twitter.

And posts pictures that show him with his deputy Jaroslaw Kaczynski as well as Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala and his Slovenian colleague Janez Jansa at a table with a map of Ukraine.

Where exactly they originated is unclear.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Demys Schmyhal praised the courage of the trio.

"The courage of the true friends of Ukraine," wrote Schmyhal on Twitter on Tuesday evening.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyj published a video on Telegram late Tuesday evening showing him, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala and his Slovenian colleague Janez Jansa with other participants in a windowless room.

"Your visit to Kyiv at this difficult time for Ukraine is a strong sign of support. We really appreciate it," said Zelenskyy.

Since the beginning of the war, Kyiv has been repeatedly hit by Russian missiles.

Mayor Vitali Klitschko has just imposed a curfew from Tuesday evening to Thursday morning after further serious attacks.

Many residents of the city are holding out in bunkers and shelters.

A flight to the embattled Ukrainian capital is unthinkable under these conditions.

Otherwise it is currently not suitable as a travel destination for political celebrities.

And so it came as a surprise when Poland's government spokesman Piotr Müller announced on Tuesday morning that a train carrying the four top politicians was on its way to Kyiv and had already crossed the Polish-Ukrainian border.

Trains overflowing with refugees coming from the opposite direction

According to Warsaw, the trip was planned “under the strictest secrecy”.

The travel route also remains top secret for the time being.

Morawiecki's head of office, Michal Dworczyk, only revealed in the evening that the special train had left Przemysl.

The train station in the eastern Polish city has a Russian broad gauge track, which is also laid in Ukraine.

Overcrowded trains arrive there from the opposite direction.

They bring thousands of desperate people fleeing war in Ukraine.

The visit was closely coordinated with EU Council President Charles Michel and EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, says Poland's government spokesman: "The delegation de facto represents the European Union, the European Council".

EU circles, on the other hand, say that the European Council has no official mandate, as no formal decision has been taken by the 27 EU countries.

According to Michel's spokesman, von der Leyen and Michel were themselves informed about a possible meeting on the sidelines of an EU summit at the end of last week.

In Warsaw, the government spokesman used the question of why the EU leaders weren't going to Kyiv themselves to dig at the Brussels bureaucrats.

"This is a difficult question, but it is a question of the individual decisions of every European leader." Don't von der Leyen and Michel have enough guts in their bones for the hell trip to Kyiv?

An EU official later admitted that the EU Council President pointed out security risks with regard to such a trip.

When asked why von der Leyen wasn't on the train, he only called it "strange".

In Poland, the visit brings back memories of an initiative by President Lech Kaczynski, who died in a plane crash in 2010.

During the 2008 war in Georgia, Kaczynski traveled to Tbilisi with the presidents of Lithuania, Estonia and Ukraine, as well as the Latvian head of government, to show solidarity with the country in the conflict with Russia.

"But Morawiecki and his colleagues' trip to Kyiv is much more dangerous than Kaczynski's visit back then," says Jerzy Haszczynski, foreign policy expert for the Polish newspaper "Rzeczpospolita".

The journalist himself had just spent ten days in embattled Kyiv.

Tbilisi was not under rocket fire in 2008.

"No one was sitting in the bunker there." It's different now in Kyiv.

Morawiecki's chancellor doesn't want to answer the question that evening as to whether the top politicians will spend the night in Kyiv or whether they will take their special train back to Poland immediately after meeting Zelensky.

For security reasons, details of the trip will only be communicated once the delegation has returned safely.