Every Day, New Russian Strikes and Reality Itself Prove That It Is Russia That Must Be Forced Into Peace – Address by the President
I wish you health, fellow Ukrainians!
I held a Staff meeting. There was a detailed analysis of today's Russian strike and the operation of our air defenses. We usually do such analyses of combat activities after massive attacks – identifying weak points as well as lessons learned that deserve to be shared. Today, all the necessary reports on this were presented. Special emphasis was placed on the effectiveness of our air defenses. In total, the Russians used more than 260 aerial attack assets in this strike: cruise and ballistic missiles, attack drones. Our troops succeeded in responding to the attack with the highest level of professionalism. I want to thank every unit, all the services involved, all our warriors. As always, the attack was repelled in a comprehensive manner. Among other things, we deployed fighter aircraft – F16s and French Mirage jets, which performed exceptionally well today. Emmanuel, thank you! I want to commend all our fighter pilots, our helicopter crews of the Ukrainian Defense Forces, our electronic warfare units and mobile fire groups of our army, and especially the units of the 160th Anti-Aircraft Missile Odesa Brigade, the 208th Anti-Aircraft Missile Kherson Brigade and the 540th Anti-Aircraft Missile Lviv Brigade. Well-done, warriors!
We are also working very actively to prevent any shortages in supplies to protect lives. Ukraine's Minister of Defense Umerov is practically on a continuous business trip – constantly in meetings and in communication with partners to secure new support packages, with air defense, of course, being the top priority.
Today, this Russian strike on our energy system and civilian facilities occurred so routinely for Russia, so vile and cynical, as always, as if there are no efforts at all from Ukraine and the world to end this war. Ukraine is ready for peace as soon as possible – we have proposed concrete steps. And every day, new Russian strikes and reality itself prove that it is Russia that must be forced into peace – into stopping the war, into real diplomacy, into ensuring security and into a reliable and lasting peace. I thank everyone who is helping Ukraine, everyone who is supporting our state, our people, our defense, and simply the truth.
And a few other things. This week we have significantly increased our support in Europe. Both from the EU and from individual countries. There is a particularly strong decision from Norway to finance our resilience – the level of announced assistance this year has been increased to USD 7.7 billion, and most of it will be allocated to weapons production in Ukraine. This will help a lot. Thank you. We also expect decisions from other Nordic countries. France will expedite its security assistance. The Netherlands is ready to invest EUR 700 million in the production of drones. There are new decisions by our Baltic friends to support us. We have solid security agreements with European Council President Costa and European Commission President von der Leyen. We are preparing for a meeting at the level of the Chiefs of General Staff in France.
We continue working on the relevant steps with our partners who want peace, who want it just as much as we do. And next week there will be a lot of work here in Europe, with America, in Saudi Arabia – we are preparing a meeting to accelerate peace and strengthen the foundations of security. Today, throughout the day, the most intensive work to date has been ongoing with President Trump's team at various levels – with many phone calls. The agenda is clear – peace as soon as possible, security as reliable as possible. Ukraine is committed to the most constructive approach.
We thank everyone who is helping us!
Glory to Ukraine!
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