UZHHOROD, May 08 (WP)- First lady Jill Biden crossed the border into Ukraine on Sunday, entering an active war zone in a rare move for the spouse of a sitting president.

Biden entered the country on Mother’s Day from Slovakia after she visited a processing center at the Vysne Nemecke border crossing and met with refugees. Inside Ukraine, she met with Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska, who has not previously appeared in public since the Feb. 24 Russian invasion of her country.

“I wanted to come in Mother’s Day,” Biden said before the start of a closed-door meeting between the two first ladies. “I thought it was important to show the Ukrainian people that this war has to stop and this war has been brutal and that the people of the United States stand with the people of Ukraine.”

Zelenska praised Biden “for a very courageous act” in coming to Ukraine.