The High Representative for Foreign Policy of the European Union, Josep Borrell, regretted this Wednesday the hesitations of the 27 in aid to Ukraine, stating that if the decisions had been faster, perhaps the course of the war would have been different.
“We did a lot for the war in Ukraine, but we hesitated a lot,” criticized Borrell, during his speech at the Diplomatic Seminar, which takes place this Wednesday and Thursday at the Oriente Foundation, in Lisbon.
“If we had not hesitated so much, perhaps the war would have taken a different course,” he said, stressing that “we have to be quicker to help.”
According to the Foreign Policy representative of the European Union (EU), all decisions to send weapons systems were preceded by weeks of talks and doubts that only resulted in a delay in the transfer of military support requested by kyiv.
Although he acknowledged that it was difficult “to bring 27 States to an agreement in a situation as tremendous as a war on their borders,” Josep Borrell stressed that “Europe cannot give up its support for Ukraine.”
“If Russia achieves its objective, Europe will be in danger,” he warned, adding that “the support given so far is not enough.”
“I would like there to be prospects for peace, but frankly I don’t see it. The prospects focus more on a military conflict than on the search for a peaceful solution,” he said.
Russian President Vladimir “Putin has no intention of ending this war until he achieves his objectives, as demonstrated by last week’s attacks.”
Russia has launched around 300 missiles and 200 drones against Ukraine since December 29, and Putin guaranteed that it will intensify its attacks against military targets in Ukraine.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Tuesday called on international partners to accelerate the delivery of military aid, especially air defense systems, following the multiplication of Russian attacks.
Initially, the EU representative recalled, the response of the 27 Member States to the war in Ukraine was easily agreed upon.
“In just a few days, we had a unanimous response to mobilize financial resources and, for the first time, send military aid to a country at war,” he said.
In recent times, this unanimity is not so solid and, “the longer the war lasts, the more difficult it will be to maintain” unity.
Questioned, during the seminar, by the Portuguese ambassador in Moscow, Mariana Fisher, about the relations that can be expected between Europe and Russia when the war ends, the head of European diplomacy admitted that “everything depends on how [o conflito] end.”
“It is very difficult to imagine how we will relate to Russia,” he acknowledged, noting that there cannot be “permanent instability on Europe’s eastern border.”
Josep Borrell participated this Wednesday, as a special guest, in the first day of the Diplomatic Seminar, an annual meeting promoted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs with Portuguese diplomats to debate foreign policy priorities.
Source: TSF
