Volodymyr Zelenskyy wears a black tie with a dark suit;

The appearance of a state president at an international conference cannot seem more serious.

The Ukrainian head of state does not want to be a part of the usual business and hustle and bustle, which also prevails in the ballroom of the Bayerischer Hof, the main stage of the Munich Security Conference.

He wants to wait a while, says Selenskyj into the excited hall, "because I want to be understood from the start".

Into the silence he then states that his country, Ukraine, longs for peace, and Europe longs for peace.

Russia claims it does not want to attack - "someone is lying here," he notes.

Johannes Leithauser

Political correspondent in Berlin.

  • Follow I follow

Selenskyj begins with dignity.

He tells of the children on the line of confrontation to the Separatist areas in the east who have to go to school between freshly shelled craters.

He addresses Russian explosions and provocations and promises that Ukraine will not be provoked.

Then he tries to draw the audience, politicians and generals from all over the world into the fate that may be threatening his country.

The international security architecture has become "fragile and obsolete," he says.

The United Nations could no longer defend its own charter against the violations inflicted on it by one of the permanent members of the Security Council.

A new security system must be created, the Ukrainian President demands and reminds

"Open and honest answers"

Instead, however, Ukraine is still being held back eight years after the first Russian aggression, and there is still no clear willingness to allow it to join the European Union or become a member of NATO.

Now Selenskyj speaks bitterly.

NATO always speaks of its "open door".

But what Ukraine needs are open and honest answers.

Literally, he said: "We need honest answers." And he says clearly that his country does not want to be "the buffer between Russia and the West" forever.

Shortly before, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi had suggested such a role for Ukraine. He had suggested to the Munich security audience that Ukraine could see itself as a “bridge” between Russia and the West.

In the end, Selensky sounds almost desperate.

He speaks of the international friends that Ukraine has won, and yet makes it very clear that their verbal solidarity, the "delivery of 5000 helmets" and the financial support cannot be a sufficient counterweight to Russian aggression.

Everyone wants Ukraine to be weak, the president exclaims, "a weak economy, a weak currency, a weak army." His country is already being kept small and destabilized.

How to help him?

"Strengthen our army, give us money, strengthen our economy," he demands, and in the end reveals how little he trusts that the West's constant threats of sanctions against Putin could prevent a war.

If the Americans said they knew the invasion would begin in a few days, why didn't they impose sanctions now?

And why didn't they even want to reveal what sanctions Putin can expect, asks Zelenskyy.

And suspects, disillusioned, that this may be because the West ultimately did not agree at all on its sanctions.