Ukraine's presidential candidates have travelled to Paris and Berlin to seek international backing nine days before the April 21 runoff vote, according to Aljazeera.
French President Emmanuel Macron first hosted comic Volodymyr Zelensky, a political novice who is tipped to become Ukraine's sixth president, for talks in Paris before a planned meeting with the incumbent, President Petro Poroshenko.
Poroshenko, who is anxious to make up ground lost to Zelensky by showing off his experience, travelled earlier in the day to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin.
Both men were expected to discuss Ukraine's five-year war with Russian-backed rebels in the country's east, a conflict in which France and Germany have attempted to broker peace.