Volodymyr Zelensky received praise from British MPs. In his second visit abroad since the start of the Russian invasion almost a year ago, the Ukrainian president spoke on Wednesday before the deputies of the House of Commons, in the famous hall of the Palace of Westminster.
“The world needs the UK as much as it needs the courage of the Ukrainians,” he pleaded to applause.
“Russia will lose”
Volodymyr Zelensky began his speech like this by thanking the British, “being by Kyiv’s side from the first seconds”. The United Kingdom is, in fact, the second largest financial backer of Ukraine after the United States.
“We have defeated evil in the past,” he continued. “We will always defeat evil. This is the heart of our traditions and yours.”
“We know that the truth will win and Russia will lose,” he said. “Victory will change the world, a change the world has needed for a long time.”
“In the future, any aggressor will know what awaits him if he attacks the international order,” warned the Ukrainian president. “All aggressors will be defeated.”
After tea, fighter planes.
Volodymyr Zelensky regretted, however, that “evil is still there”, a year after the start of the conflict. “Every day that separates us from victory, we pay for it with deaths, with tears,” he added.
The Ukrainian leader is in London in particular to ask his partners for fighter planes for his army. He showed the helmet of a Ukrainian pilot and read the message written on it: “We have freedom, give us wings to protect it.”
After securing the shipment of heavy main battle tanks, Ukraine now intends to receive combat aircraft. A possibility ruled out by Joe Biden, while Emmanuel Macron cautiously responded: “Nothing is prohibited in principle.”
“Two years ago I left thanking the tea, this time I leave thanking the powerful British planes in advance,” Volodymyr Zelensky told parliamentarians, recalling his last visit to London.
The Ukrainian president has already received pilot training from London, an apparent first step toward handing over fighter jets. He is then expected this Wednesday evening in Paris, where he will meet Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Source: BFM TV
