In a speech, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked the international community for the solidarity with his country. In a video message published by Telegram, which was also broadcast on television, he asked Europeans for their support. “If Ukraine doesn’t survive, the whole of Europe won’t survive,” said Zelenskyy. “If we fall, so will you.”
Zelenskyi strongly condemned NATO’s decision not to establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine. “By refusing to create a no-fly zone, the leadership of the military alliance gave the green light for further bombing of Ukrainian towns and villages,” Zelenskyy said in a video released on Friday.
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“We believe that the NATO countries themselves created the narrative that closing the skies over Ukraine would provoke direct Russian aggression against NATO,” Zelenskyy said.
Addressing the Western Alliance, he added: “All the people who will die from now on will also die because of you. Because of your weakness, because of your disconnection.”
He doesn’t know who NATO can protect, whether it’s capable of defending its own countries. Blood is being shed in Ukraine “for our common Europe, our common freedom, our common future”. You can’t just buy your way out of it with deliveries of diesel.
NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg rejected Ukraine’s request for a no-fly zone after a special meeting of foreign ministers in Brussels on Friday.
Stoltenberg warned against an escalation of the war
The alliance understands the “desperation” of the Ukrainian government, said Stoltenberg. However, if NATO intervened militarily in the conflict with Russia, numerous other countries in Europe would be drawn into the war.
In order to control a no-fly zone, NATO fighter jets would have to “shoot down Russian planes” over Ukraine, Stoltenberg said. “If we did that, it would result in a full-scale war in Europe, involving many more countries and causing even more human suffering.”
Zelenskyj is currently sending daily video messages to the Ukrainian population and abroad. Thousands of people listened to him at a peace demonstration in the Czech Republic.
On Saturday, the Ukrainian president is scheduled to attend a session of the US Senate via video link, the AFP news agency learned from parliamentary circles. Some US MPs support Zelenskyy’s call for a no-fly zone over his country.
