War in Ukraine: what to remember from Volodymyr Zelensky's speech at the G7

Europe 1 with AFP 6:25 p.m., October 11, 2022

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky insisted on Tuesday that Vladimir Putin still had the means for an "escalation", calling on his G7 counterparts to help create an air shield to stop the Russian strikes that have been raining down on his country for two days. .

"The Russian leader, who is at the end of his reign, still has the means for an escalation," said the Ukrainian president during an emergency virtual meeting of the leaders of the G7 countries, according to the English text of his speech broadcast by the Ukrainian presidency.

"I ask you to strengthen the general effort to financially help create an air shield for Ukraine," he said, saying "millions of people will be grateful to the G7 for such assistance." .

The Ukrainian president also accused Moscow on Tuesday of wanting to drag Belarus into the conflict and called for "a mission of international observers stationed on the border between Ukraine and Belarus to monitor the security situation there".

Belarus, soon to be a major player in the conflict? 

"Russia is trying to drag Belarus directly into this war," he said.

On Monday, Minsk announced the creation of a joint military force with its Russian ally and accused kyiv of fomenting an attack against Belarus, raising fears of its direct intervention in the conflict in Ukraine.

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"Ukraine has not planned and does not plan military actions against Belarus," Volodymyr Zelensky repeated on Tuesday.

The Ukrainian leader also again called on his Western allies to strengthen sanctions against Moscow and military aid to Ukraine after two days of heavy bombardment by the Russian army.

"There can be no dialogue with this Russian leader" 

The Ukrainian leader counted "more than a hundred missile fires in less than two days against civilians and civilian infrastructure".

"Russia wants to cause chaos in Ukraine and in the entire democratic world, and therefore uses everything: from missile strikes to the seizure of a nuclear power plant, threats of nuclear disaster, sabotage against infrastructure in Europe to a deliberate attempt to destroy Ukrainian energy facilities," he said.

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Moscow claims for its part to have hit Ukrainian energy infrastructure in several regions, in retaliation for the partial destruction of the Crimean bridge on Saturday and after several failures on the military ground.

Volodymyr Zelensky finally repeated to his G7 counterparts that he did not want to negotiate with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin: "There can be no dialogue with this Russian leader who has no future", he said. -he throws.