PHILADELPHIA — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, appearing via recorded video, was honored at the National Constitution Center on Monday night as the 2022 recipient of the Liberty Medal.
U.S. Sens. Chris Coons, D-Del., and Rob Portman, R-Ohio, visited Kyiv last week and presented the medal in person to Zelenskyy. The Constitution Center announced the award in August and said Zelenskyy was selected “for his heroic defense of liberty in the face of Russian tyranny” during the war in Ukraine.
In a brief video message shown at the ceremony in Philadelphia on Monday night, former President George W. Bush called Zelenskyy “the Winston Churchill of our time.”
Jeffrey Rosen, president of the National Constitution Center, read a letter from President Joe Biden, who called Zelenskyy a “rare patriot.”
Biden continued: “When Russia launched its brutal assault against Ukraine eight months ago, President Zelenskyy stood strong and declared, ‘The President is here.’ His words lifted the Ukrainian people and echoed around the world. Today, he continues to fearlessly lead his country, defend Ukraine’s sovereignty, and fight to uphold the basic values that unite us all.”
The Liberty Medal, established in 1988 and awarded at the National Constitution Center since 2006, has been given international leaders and other celebrated figures who have worked to protect freedom around world. Past recipients include Nelson Mandela, Mikhail Gorbachev, Muhammad Ali, Lech Walesa, Vaclav Havel and Viktor Yushchenko, the former president of Ukraine who was notoriously disfigured by a poisoning suspected to have been caused by Russians.
The medal comes with a $100,000 prize, which Zelenskyy said he will donate to a new Ukrainian Veteran Fund.
Since the Russian invasion in late February, Zelenskyy, widely praised for his inspirational leadership, has been honored with the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award and the Ronald Reagan Freedom Award.
Appearing at Monday night’s ceremony, Coons recounted his 10-hour train ride from Poland to Kyiv and declared that Ukraine today “is the frontline of freedom globally.”
Zelenskyy’s video acceptance speech was introduced by Iryna Mazur, honorary consul to Ukraine in Philadelphia, who told the audience in attendance and viewers watching the event livestream that “(i)f you are here today, as a guest or as a sponsor, it means President Zelenskyy has touched your heart. He, together with the entire Ukrainian nation, have become a symbol of unity, strength and uncompromised desire for independence, for the basic human right to be free and to choose your own future.”
In his video acceptance speech, which Rosen said had been recorded just a few hours earlier, Zelenskyy, dressed in his familiar olive-green T-shirt, said that millions of people are fighting and working to protect Ukraine, and the Liberty Medal honors them.
“And we see now what democracies are capable of when they act in unity,” Zelenskyy said. “Every potential aggressor in the world sees the help that the United States and the free world is providing to us, and all the sanctions imposed against Russia sees and believes that it is better not to start a war against freedom at all,” Zelenskyy said.
He added that he considered the medal to be an honor “to all friends of freedom in the United States and other countries, to all those who are helping us to restore our territorial integrity, and thus, to restore peace.”
Zelenskyy asked for the people watching and listening “to maintain unwavering unity as it is now, until that very day when we all hear those important words we have been dreaming of, until we hear that peace has finally been restored.”
