“There are things to discuss with the Russian leader. I am not telling you that our people are eager to talk to him, but we have to face the realities of what we are experiencing,” Zelensky said in a speech to an Indonesian think tank.
He continued, “What do we want from this meeting… We want our lives back… We want to restore the life of a sovereign state within its territory,” adding that Russia does not seem ready yet for serious peace talks.
Earlier, Zelensky urged the West to stop messing with Russia and impose tougher sanctions on Moscow to end its “futile war” in Ukraine, adding that his country would remain independent but the only question was at what cost.
Zelensky’s criticism of the West has escalated in recent days as the European Union moves slowly toward a possible embargo on Russian oil and as thousands of Russian soldiers try to encircle two major cities in the east of the country, Severodonetsk and Lysichansk.
“Ukraine will remain an independent state and will not be defeated. The only question is what price our people will have to pay for their freedom, and what price Russia will pay for this futile war against us,” Zelensky said.
He added, “It is still possible to stop the catastrophic events if the world deals with the situation in Ukraine as if it were facing the same situation, and if the forces did not mess with Russia and actually pressed for an end to the war.”
Zelensky complained about disagreements within the European Union over imposing more sanctions on Russia and questioned why some countries were allowed to block the plan.
The Ukrainian president also appealed to the West to send multiple launch missile systems to Ukraine as soon as possible to give it a chance to repel the Russian attack in Donbas.
“We are fighting for Ukraine to have all the weapons needed to change the nature of the fighting and start moving faster and more confidently in the direction of expelling the occupiers,” Zelensky said.
He added that the Russian forces are erasing some eastern towns from the face of the earth, and the area may end up becoming “uninhabited.”
“They want to turn Popasna, Bakhmut, Lyman, Lychansk and Severodonetsk into ashes, as they did with Volnovakia and Mariupol,” he added.
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