War in Ukraine: “Russia will be defeated as Nazism was defeated,” says Zelensky

President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, said this Monday on the occasion of much of Europe’s celebration of Victory Day about Nazism that Russia will be defeated in the current war in the same way that Nazi Germany was defeated in WWII.

“We fought then and we fight now so that no one ever again enslaves other nations and destroys other countries,” Zelensky said in an address to the nation on Monday. “All the old evils that modern Russia is bringing back they will be defeated just like Nazism was defeated,” Zelensky added.

The Ukrainian head of state also announced that Ukraine will stop celebrating Victory over Nazism Day on May 9, as is the case in Russia, and will henceforth side with EU countries commemorating this historic milestone on May 8.

Ukraine it thus departs from a Soviet tradition which has become a huge annual festival of nationalist aggrandizement in Russia where Ukraine is associated with the Nazis and the current Russian military with the Soviet forces that defeated Nazism along with their Western allies, who are generally ignored at Russian celebrations.

In addition to designating May 8 as Victory Day, Zelensky stressed the importance of reclaiming the role of Ukrainians in the military defeat of Nazism. The Ukrainian head of state recalled this 8 million compatriots theirs died in WWII.

Zelenski signed another decree on Monday establishing the 9 May as Europe Day, thus joining the EU countries, which celebrate on this date the unity of the continent that emerged from the defeat of Nazi totalitarianism in 1945.

The Ukrainian head of state said in this regard that “the unity of all Europeans” “has defeated Nazism” and “will defeat the ‘ruschism‘”, a newly coined term recognized this month by the Ukrainian parliament to designate totalitarian ideology which according to the Kiev government was imposed on neighboring Russia.

Von der Leyen in Kiev

On the occasion of Europe Day, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, will meet Zelensky in Kiev.

The Commission’s main spokesman, Eric Mamer, declined to give details of the visit for security reasons and limited himself to stating that both leaders will discuss Ukraine’s EU accession process.

Brussels is to draw up a preliminary report in the summer the progress that Kiev is making in the reforms that Brussels is asking before being able to start accession negotiations and, in December, a second more complete analysis.

The last time that Von der Leyen went to Kiev was in February, together with about fifteen commissioners, but the president of the Commission and the president of Ukraine met for the last time in Brussels, a week later, during a European summit.

More sanctions against Russia

Mamer also recalled that the Commission sent its proposal to the ambassadors of the Twenty-seven last Friday an eleventh package of sanctions against Russia for invading Ukraine.

According to him, this new block of sanctions focuses above all on the application of those already agreed, on their effectiveness and how to prevent them from being bypassed by Moscow.

Specifically, the EU wants to prevent goods whose export to Russia is prohibited by already approved sanctions from finding their way to that country.

EFE extension

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