Tuesday 17 May 2022 01:10 PM Ukraine war: President Zelensky seen with his wife for first time since invasion trends now Volodymyr Zelensky has been pictured with wife Olena for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine almost three months ago, as the couple attended the funeral of the country's first president in Kyiv today. The Zelenskys looked calm but exhausted as they walked together to lay flowers on top of the coffin of Leonid Kravchuk, who became the first to lead an independent Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. He died at the weekend, at the age of 88. Dressed all in black instead of his now-trademark military green, Zelensky's hands hung loose at his sides while his wife balled hers into a fist, as if resisting the urge to reach out and clasp her husband after so long apart. They were joined by other dignitaries including Kyiv mayor Vitaly Klitschko as the funeral took place in Ukrainian House on Tuesday, in a city still trying to recover from Russia's attempt to seize the city. Olena's appearance comes a month after she revealed that she has only spoken to her husband by phone since the war broke out, fearful that joining him in the Ukrainian capital would put her and their two young children at risk of being killed. Recalling some of the last words her husband spoke to her in person, Olena said Zelenska woke her as the first Russian missiles slammed into the city, saying only: 'It started.' As troops arrived to protect Zelensky from squads of Russian assassins they knew would be heading to the presidential palace, Olena and her children - Aleksandra, 17, and Kiril, nine - were whisked away. It is not clear exactly when she returned to Kyiv, but the couple spent at least the six weeks apart. Asked what she said to her children, the First Lady told Vogue magazine: 'There is no need to explain anything to children. They see everything, as does every child in Ukraine. 'Surely, this is not something that children should see – but children are very honest and sincere. You can’t hide anything from them.' She spoke of the patriotism embedding itself within Ukrainian youths because of the war, who she said would grow up to be patriots and defenders of their homeland. When it comes to children, the best strategy is the truth, she added. The First Lady said Vladimir Putin had set out to divide the people of her country, but that such a task was impossible with Ukrainians. 'When one of us is tortured, raped, or killed, we feel that we all are being tortured, raped, or killed,' said the Ukraine's First Lady. 'We do not need propaganda to feel civic consciousness, and to resist. 'It is this personal anger and pain, which we all feel, that instantly activates the thirst to act, to resist aggression, to defend our freedom.' She described how Ukraine had become a country of volunteers: with artists, restaurateurs and hairdressers all working together to help their brothers in arms. Thousands of women have had to give birth in bomb shelters, like the one in Mariupol, because of the conditions they are living under. Many women have risked their lives while fleeing occupied cities on foot, taking their children without the help of their husbands, brothers and fathers - who all had to stay and fight the invaders. As the cities become de-occupied, the world is realising what those women were fleeing, she said. Bucha, and other villages around Kyiv, have been liberated after Russian forces retreated, revealing mass graves of slaughtered civilians. Russia previously ignored humanitarian corridors and bombed civilians fleeing occupied cities, many of them women and children. Some four million Ukrainian women and children have migrated to other countries, starting their lives all over again far away from home. She said she was infinitely grateful for the countries which had taken in Ukrainians fleeing the war with Russia, but added her voice to the call for the enforcement of a no-fly zone - with the hope of preventing Russian rocket attacks on civilian areas. The First Lady launched a Telegram channel inviting Ukrainians to share their war experiences, using the messages as a way of documenting the history of their country so that their personal stories can be remembered. A woman reads a book as residents find shelter from shelling in a metro station, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine, April 11, 2022 Officials exhume the bodies of civilians who died during the Russian attacks, from mass graves in Bucha, Ukraine on April 11 A family mourns a relative killed during the war with Russia, as dozens of black bags containing more bodies of victims are seen strewn across the graveyard in the cemetery in Bucha, in the outskirts of Kyiv A Russian serviceman walks in front of destroyed apartment buildings in the shelling of two weeks ago by a 'Uragan' missile, in Donetsk, Ukraine, 11 April 2022 All rights reserved for this news site (dailymail) and under his responsibility