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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy delivered a defiant statement Saturday calling NATO countries “weak” and “insecure,” and asserting that their refusal to implement a no-fly zone has given Russia a “green light” to kill Ukrainians.
“All the people who die from this day forward will also die because of you, because of your weakness, because of your lack of unity,” he said, according to The Independent.
“The alliance has given the green light to the bombing of Ukrainian cities and villages by refusing to create a no-fly zone. All that the alliance was able to do today was to pass through its procurement system 50 tons of diesel fuel for Ukraine,” the angry leader added.
His remarks were made around 5:30 pm EST Friday (American east coast time) or 12:30 am ETT Saturday (Ukrainian time):
We continue to fight. We will protect our state. We will liberate our land. Thanks to our heroes.
Posted by Володимир Зеленський on Friday, March 4, 2022
Western leaders like U.S. President Joe Biden have abstained from establishing a no-fly zone out of concerns it could trigger World War III.
“The only way to implement a no-fly zone is to send Nato planes – fighter planes – into Ukrainian airspace, and then impose that no-fly zone by shooting down Russian planes,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg reportedly said at a NATO meeting in Brussels that occurred a couple of hours before Zelenskyy’s remarks.
He added that were a no-fly zone imposed, “we’ll end up with something that could end in a full-fledged war in Europe involving many more countries and causing much more human suffering.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken echoed this point.
“[E]ven as we are doing everything we can to give the Ukrainian people the means to defend themselves effectively against Russia, we also have a responsibility … to ensure that the war doesn’t spill over even beyond Ukraine,” he said at the same meeting in Brussels.
“And again … the only way to actually implement something like a no-fly zone is to send NATO planes into Ukrainian airspace and to shoot down Russian planes, and that could lead to a full-fledged war in Europe. President Biden has been clear that we are not going to get into a war with Russia,” according to Blinken.
Blinken, asked at ongoing presser if the ‘no’ to a no-fly zone is set in stone, echoes NATO SecGen and says “we have a responsibility…to ensure that the war doesn’t spill over even beyond Ukraine”https://t.co/77EAPL2XSc
— Olivia Gazis (@Olivia_Gazis) March 4, 2022
In his midnight address, Zelenskyy also sought to squash this narrative.
“We believe that NATO countries have created a narrative that closing the skies over Ukraine would provoke Russia’s direct aggression against NATO. This is the self-hypnosis of those who are weak, insecure inside, despite the fact they possess weapons many times stronger than we have,” he said.
It’s not clear why he thought confronting NATO nations would incentivize them to intervene more in Ukraine, even it means risking triggering World War III.
It’s also not clear why he did not note all of the sanctions NATO has imposed on Russia — sanctions that have in many instances boomeranged right back to them via, as just one example, increased gas prices.
“U.S. gas prices are rising at a record pace as Western sanctions on Russia’s financial and shipping industries cut off oil supplies from global markets and refineries struggle to keep up with surging demand,” The Washington Post reported Friday.
Citing numbers from AAA, the Post confirmed that the “average price per gallon of unleaded gasoline jumped 9 cents at domestic service stations Friday to $3.84” after having already jumped seven cents just a day earlier.
“A week ago, drivers paid 26 cents less on average per gallon,” according to the Post.
Dovetailing back to Zelenskyy’s address, he also used it to announce that a temporary ceasefire had been reached with the Russians in the city of Mariupol. By Saturday morning EST, however, the ceasefire had already been breached, reportedly by the Russians.
“The evacuation of civilians from the southern city of Mariupol has been postponed, according to the Mariupol city council. It says this is due to ‘the fact that the Russian side does not adhere to the regime of silence and continued shelling of both Mariupol itself’ and the surrounding area,” Sky News has confirmed.
Mariupol has reportedly sustained some of the most intense shelling during the ongoing conflict, leading to a situation where hundreds of thousands of desperate residents are now reportedly without food, water and heating.
Mariupol is on the verge of a humanitarian catastrophe. The city is under fire from Russian troops. Houses are destroyed, there’s no heat,electricity,water & food.
Having spent all my childhood in Ukraine – it’s heartbreaking to see what the Russian army has done to the country pic.twitter.com/s0faj64VRw
— Hanna Liubakova (@HannaLiubakova) March 4, 2022
“We do not have electricity … we do not have water supply, we do not have sanitary system, and we do not have heating … We have continuous shelling for 26 hours … they are destroying our city.”
Mariupol Dep. Mayor Sergei Orlov as Russian troops surround his city. pic.twitter.com/idyptxbxY8
— CNN (@CNN) March 3, 2022
Video verified by The New York Times shows civilian areas burning and destroyed in Mariupol, Ukraine. By @MashaFroliak @heytherehaley @dim109 @sskerrr pic.twitter.com/uyGuxjTSwf
— Ainara Tiefenthäler (@tiefenthaeler) March 4, 2022
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