Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky in a televised address late on Monday urged the Ukrainians that the nation will respond to Russia if it sticks to its aggressive stance. “We are on our land. We don’t fear anything or anyone. We don’t owe anything to anyone. And we won’t give anything up,” Zelensky said in a late night TV address.
Zelensky also met the National Security and Defence Council to decide the next course of action. He also dialled French president Emmanuel Macron and German chancellor Olaf Scholz to discuss measures to address this ever growing crisis. In his address he also urged the West to take swift measures in response to Russia’s actions. He sought retaliatory sanctions on Moscow and urged its western allies to keep their promises.
“It is very important now to see who is our real friend and partner, and who will continue ‘scaring’ the Russian Federation with words,” Zelensky said. He, however, urged that an urgent meeting of the Normandy Format countries – Germany, France, Ukraine, and Russia be held.
Calls For Resistance
Regular citizens of Kyiv say they are ready to face Russian forces if they decide to invade. Speaking to AFP, residents of Kyiv expressed clearly that they will not bow down to Russian aggression. Maria Levchyshchyna speaking to news agency Associated Press chose to question Russia’s move.
“Why should Russia recognise it? If neighbours come to you and say, ‘This room will be ours,’ would you care about their opinion or not? It’s your flat, and it will always be your flat,” Levchyshchyna was quoted as saying.
Chef Artem Ivaschenko, who originally hails from Donetsk where the streets cheered Russian recognition of the rebel regime, says he is shocked. “I live here, I already lost a part of my homeland, it was taken away, so I will protect it,” Ivaschenko said.
But some Kyivians have also resorted to military training. Weeks before the announcement news agencies shared reports of dozens of Ukrainians taking military training using fake AK-47s and guns to counter the Russian threat. On Monday following the Russian announcement the resolve seems to have only grown stronger as some now use guns with live rounds for their now-daily practice. News agency Kyiv Post spoke to civilian members of the 130th Territorial Defence Battalion whose numbers have now gone beyond hundred. “Everybody here understands that nobody is going to be defending this country but us, the Ukrainians,” Anton Goloborodko, the chairman of Ukraine’s Reservists Council tells young men and women who are ready to give back as good as it gets when the tanks roll.
Read the Latest News and Breaking News here
Comments
0 comment