The President of Ukraine, Volodimir Zelenski, has assured on Friday that the «fiercest» conflicts recorded this week have been concentrated in the Donbas region, specifically in the towns of Bakhmut and Soledar, where he said that the Ukrainian Army «maintains its positions».
«We hold our positions. And in these and some other directions in the Donetsk region, the Russian army has already spent as many lives of its people and as much ammunition as it probably did not spend in the two Chechen wars combined,» he has maintained in his daily address.
In this regard, the president has insisted that Russia hides the number of casualties on its side from its civilians and has questioned whether this country has put an end to the partial military mobilization as it assured a week ago. «The truth is that in the regions of Russia and in our occupied territory they continue to gather people to send them to death», he pointed out.
This, he has assured, «is an indicator (…) that their alleged readiness to negotiate is just as false». Zelenski criticized that when one truly has this intention «he does not look for ways to deceive all those around him in order to send to the ‘meat grinder’ tens or hundreds of thousands more people, mobilized or in the form of some mercenaries».
Once again, he pointed out that Ukraine is ready for peace, «a just peace» which includes respect for the UN Charter, respect for the territorial integrity of the country and its people, as well as demanding accountability for «terrorism».
He also referred to this Friday’s visit to Kiev of the National Security Advisor to the President of the United States, an interaction he underlined as «very useful» for the protection of the state. «We are working on the issue of air defense and missile defense for Ukraine,» he has stated.
He has also appreciated the statement issued by the foreign ministers of the G7 countries, which he has assured that it covers «key aspects» of their defense situation in the face of Russian aggression such as the creation of a coordination mechanism to help the country rebuild its critical energy infrastructure.
He also recalled that this date marks 31 years since the adoption of the Ukrainian regulation on the state border, which was one of the «fundamental documents of the restoration of Ukraine’s independence».
«We will liberate all our cities and villages, regardless of the occupiers’ plans to prolong their stay on Ukrainian soil. Ukraine will be free. And our entire border will be restored, both on land and at sea. Both in the east and in the south,» he has assured.
