Paris (AFP) – President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday urged the West to do more to achieve a fair peace as Ukraine battles the Russian invasion, telling US leader Joe Biden that Kyiv is counting on “shoulder-to-shoulder” support.
One day after Western leaders descended on northern France to mark the 80 year anniversary of the D-Day landings in World War II, Zelensky addressed the French parliament while Biden was also to deliver a keynote speech in Normandy on democracy.
Zelensky told France’s National Assembly he hoped a summit hosted by Switzerland later this month on bringing peace to Ukraine could hasten a fair end to the conflict.
“The inaugural peace summit could become a format that would bring closer a just end to this war,” Zelensky said.
“I am grateful for all you are already doing and it is a lot. But for a fair peace, more must be done,” he said.
Meeting Zelensky in Paris after the speech, Biden pledged his support for Ukraine and announced another $225 million in aid to Kyiv.
“The United States will stand with you,” Biden told Zelensky.
Biden hailed Ukraine’s “remarkable” resistance against the Russian invasion, saying: “You haven’t bowed down. You haven’t yielded at all… We’re not going to walk away from you.”
Zelensky thanked him for the “tremendous support” and compared it to the United States coming to Europe’s aid during World War II. “We count on your continuing support to stand with us shoulder-to-shoulder,” the Ukrainian leader said.
– ‘No lines for evil’ –
Kyiv has been pushing Europe to increase military support, with Russia gaining the upper hand on the battlefield in recent months, in particular in Ukraine’s eastern Kharkiv region.
The Ukrainian president warned the French parliament that 80 years after the D-Day landings of World War II, Europe was “unfortunately no longer a continent of peace” owing to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
“Can (Russian President Vladimir) Putin win this battle?” Zelensky asked parliament.
“No. Because you and I have no right to lose,” he added.
Zelensky dismissed there could be peace in Ukraine based on current front lines, with Russia sometimes deep inside Ukrainian territory.
“Can this war end on the lines that exist now? No. Because there are no lines for evil: not 80 years ago, not now.”
“And if someone tries to draw temporary lines, it will only give a pause before a new war.”
– ‘Fighter jets for Ukraine’ –
Speaking to French television, President Emmanuel Macron said late Thursday Paris would transfer Mirage 2000 fighter jets to Ukraine and train Ukrainian pilots as part of a new military cooperation.
Macron said he would offer to Zelensky that the pilots be trained starting this summer.
“You need normally between five-six months. So by the end of the year there will be pilots. The pilots will be trained in France,” he said.
He said Western allies would consider a request from Ukraine to send military instructors to train its forces on its soil to meet the growing challenge of building up troop numbers.
During Zelensky’s visit Franco-German battle tank maker KNDS announced the creation of a Ukrainian subsidiary.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Macron’s comments indicated he was ready for France to take a “direct” role in the Ukraine conflict.
– ‘Isolationism not the answer’ –
Later Friday, Biden will return to Normandy to give a speech on defending freedom and democracy at the Pointe du Hoc, a clifftop promontory where German bunkers were attacked by US troops in a daring assault during the landings.
The speech to be delivered from 1400 GMT is likely to be seen as a warning against the risk posed by his Republican rival Donald Trump in the US election later this year.
Biden, a Democrat, will unmistakably be invoking the memory of a famous speech given by late Republican president Ronald Reagan at the Normandy clifftop in 1984 where he saluted the American “boys” of the Pointe du Hoc.
Biden vowed Thursday in Normandy never to abandon international alliances or Ukraine in its fight against Russia, a swipe at Trump, who has questioned the importance of bodies like NATO.
“We’re living in a time when democracy is more at risk across the world than at any point since the end of World War II,” Biden said. “Isolationism was not the answer 80 years ago and is not the answer today,” he said.
© 2024 AFP
