President Volodymyr Zelensky told Ukrainians on Wednesday, in an emotional speech celebrating the 31st anniversary of its independence, that his country was “reborn” when Russia invaded and would never give up its struggle for freedom from Moscow’s sovereignty.
In a recorded speech published on the six-month anniversary of the Russian invasion on February 24, Zelensky said that Ukraine no longer sees when the war is over, but when Kiev is finally victorious.
“A new nation came into the world at 4 am on February 24. It was not born, it was born again. A nation that does not cry, does not scream, does not fear. It did not run away. It did not give up. And it did not forget,” he said.
The 44-year-old leader, dressed in combat, gave a speech in front of the imposing monument symbolizing his independence from the Russian-dominated Soviet Union, which he left in 1991.
Zelensky stressed his war stance, opposing any compromise that would allow Moscow to make territorial gains, including the territory of southern and eastern Ukraine, which Ukraine had captured in the last six months.
“We will not sit at the negotiating table with a gun to our heads out of fear. For us, the scariest iron missiles are not planes and tanks, but handcuffs,” he said.
He promised to regain the lands lost in Ukraine’s eastern industrial Donbas region and the Crimean peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014.
He said, “What is the end of the war to us? We used to call it peace. Now we call it victory.”
After repulsing Russian forces at the start of what Moscow describes as a “special military operation,” the Ukrainians are preparing for a protracted war – and a winter of severe power outages.
*Reporting by Pavel Polityuk, Natalia Zinets and Andrea Shalal
source: Noticias
