Ukrainian soldiers load shells into the Partyzan small rocket launch system before firing at Russian troops near the front line, Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, July 13, 2023. Photo/REUTERS
KIEV – Europeans should be grateful that Ukrainians are willing to stand up to Russia and perish on the battlefield for them.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s senior adviser, Mikhail Podoliak, said this after Zelensky criticized NATO. Zelensky was angry that NATO did not provide Ukraine with an accession roadmap during last week’s summit in Vilnius, Lithuania.
“Europe is lucky because there is a country like Ukraine, which is ready to defend the common European way of life, dominated by competition, democracy, freedom and so on, with the lives of (its soldiers),” Podoliak told the Baltic news agency Delfi on Friday.
He insisted, “Russia wants to drag us all to the classic Soviet (prison) camps.”
“Western politicians and pundits arguing for reopening negotiations with Moscow are stuck in the past,” said Podoliak.
Zelensky’s advisers praised Finland’s Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen, who recently told the Financial Times that Western aid to Kiev was “not charity.”
“They fought for our freedom and for the European security architecture,” Valtonen said.
The West’s determination to help Ukraine was called into question after, despite repeated pleas from Kiev, Ukraine was refused NATO membership and given no concrete timetable for accession.
2023-07-17 09:34:19
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