Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has denounced Russia’s Vladimir Putin as a “slave to war” in a speech to the Munich Security Conference Saturday, adding that Russia’s attacks had damaged every power plant in the country. Zelenskyy was speaking days before the fourth anniversary of Moscow’s invasion. Russia and Ukraine will hold US-brokered talks next week, and Zelensky said Kyiv was doing “everything” to end the war.
Ukraine wants security guarantees for a minimum of 20 years from the US before it can sign a peace deal with dignity, Zelenskyy said ahead of talks next week with Russia and the US. Speaking in Munich on Saturday, he also called for a clear date for Ukraine to be allowed to join the EU. Some EU officials have put the date as early as 2027. The upcoming talks will be held on Tuesday and Wednesday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies.
In an earlier speech, he said that “none of our people chose to be heroes” as he described the everyday life under Russian attacks urged Europe to “stand up to Russia” and warned against any half-baked deal with Russia saying it would be an “illusion” to think it would stop Putin from attacking again in the future.
Later in the evening, Zelenskyy held bilateral talks with US secretary of state Marco Rubio and spoke on the phone with US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Rubio cast the United States as the “child of Europe” in a message of unity on Saturday, offering some reassurance.
UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, said there was an urgent need for a closer UK defence relationship with Europe, so that the UK would be at the centre of a stronger European defence setup and economic revival, insisting “we are not the Britain of the Brexit years any more”. Starmer said “the new normal” required Europe to “take primary responsibility for its own defence”, as “the solidity of peace” was “softening” amid “warning signs” from Russia.
Russia is suffering “crazy losses” in Ukraine, tallying about 65,000 soldiers over the last two months, Nato secretary general Mark Rutte said in Munich. Separately, he told a media roundtable that the Nato alliance was strong enough that Russia would not currently try to attack it. “We will win every fight with Russia if they attack us now, and we have to make sure in two, four, six years that same is still the case,” he said.
Drone strikes killed one person in Ukraine and another in Russia, officials said Saturday. An elderly woman died when a Russian drone hit a residential building in the Black Sea port city of Odesa, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said. In Russia, a civilian was killed in a Ukrainian drone strike on a car in the border region of Bryansk, regional governor Alexander Bogomaz said.
