SINGAPORE – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said taking back Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014, as well as the country’s long-occupied eastern Donbas region are conditions for bringing the nine-month war to an end.
Seizing back all of Ukraine’s internationally recognised territory would entail ambitions that stretch beyond Russian military gains since its invasion launched in February. After Russia took over Crimea eight years ago, the Kremlin supported separatist forces in Donbas in a conflict that simmered despite a Franco-German-led peace initiative, effectively occupying much of the regions of Luhansk and Donetsk.
Despite the Ukrainian military’s recapture of more than half of the territory it had lost to Russia since February, Russia still occupies large swathes of the south and east of the country, in addition to the Black Sea peninsula. Still, after the retreat across the Dnipro and with both sides digging in ahead of the winter months, the path ahead will be “difficult”, Mr Zelensky said.
straits_times No Zelensky then?
Like that how ? We need a man of wisdom or power or probably both, to unlock the impasse, or let the war go on for another 20-30 years until Putin grow old and die.
Self evident, or should be! Glad he restated it though. ZelenskyyUa