Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has met the British prime minister and the King during a visit to London in which he pushed for more fighter jets.

Mr Zelensky visited Britain to drum up aid, winning a pledge to train Ukrainian pilots on advanced NATO fighter jets.

It was a big symbolic step up in foreign military support against Russia’s invasion.

On just his second trip abroad since Russian forces swept into Ukraine on February 24 last year, Mr Zelensky met Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and thanked Britain for “marching with us towards the most important victory of our lifetime”.

But he repeatedly hammered home a call for combat aircraft, which he referred to as “wings for freedom”.

Ukraine “will do everything possible and impossible to make the world provide us with modern planes to empower and protect pilots who will be protecting us,” Mr Zelensky told hundreds of MPs in London’s Westminster Hall.

Shortly before his arrival, Mr Sunak’s office announced plans to expand a program training Ukraine’s military to include its air force, “to ensure pilots are able to fly sophisticated NATO-standard fighter jets in the future”.

The announcement gave no time frame and stopped short of a commitment to provide Ukraine with UK jets.

But it signalled a notable shift in support that could pave the way for other countries to send planes, so far ruled out by countries wary of sending weapons capable of striking deep into Russia.

Closing his remarks, Mr Zelensky said two years ago he had left Britain parliament thanking MPs for “delicious English tea”; now he would leave “thanking you in advance for powerful English planes”.

As he wrapped up his speech in London, air raid sirens rang out in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.

Mr Sunak told parliament that Britain would give Ukraine the support it needs “to ensure a decisive military victory on the battlefield this year”.

Mr Zelensky also met the King and was due to visit Ukrainian troops training in Britain. He was then headed to Brussels, where he is expected to attend a summit of European Union leaders.

During Mr Zelensky’s London visit, Britain announced the addition of names to its Russia sanctions blacklist as well as plans to accelerate the supply of military equipment to Ukraine, including unspecified longer range weapons.

In January, Britain was the first country to offer Ukraine battle tanks, pledging 14 of them a little more than a week before the US and European allies pledged scores.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, publicly more cautious than some other leaders on arms deliveries, told MPs in Berlin decisions on weapons were best when co-ordinated behind the scenes, rather than announced separately by countries in a “public competition to outdo each other”.

Mr Scholz also said he expected strong demonstrations of support for Ukraine from this week’s EU summit, and a new round of European sanctions on Russia around the anniversary of the invasion.

After major Ukrainian gains in the second half of 2022, Russia has recovered momentum as tens of thousands of freshly mobilised troops reach the front.

Russian forces have made incremental progress in Ukraine’s east in recent weeks, in relentless winter battles which both sides describe as some of the bloodiest fighting of the war.

Ukraine said it expected Russia to broaden that offensive with a big push as the February 24 first anniversary of the invasion approaches.

“They need to have something to show before their people, and have a major desire to do something big, as they see it, by this date,” Ukrainian national security chief Oleksiy Danilov told Reuters on Tuesday.

He predicted Russia, which has focused lately on the Donetsk region in the east, would try attacks on Kharkiv further north or Zaporizhzhia further south.

“How successful they’ll be will depend on us.”