Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD: Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky received a heroic welcome in Brussels on Thursday as he lobbied starstruck European Union (EU) leaders to speed the delivery of modern weapons to halt a possible Russian offensive on its eastern borders.
Two weeks after the first anniversary of Europe’s most brutal conflict since the 1940s, Zelensky embarked on only his second foreign trip since Moscow launched a full-scale assault.
After the last day’s visits to Paris and London to lobby Britain, France, and Germany for modern fighter jets and long-range missiles, Zelensky arrived in Brussels to address EU leaders and members of the European Parliament (MEPs).
The European Parliament treated the Ukrainian President to cheers and a standing ovation as he portrayed Ukraine as a country fighting to defend the eastern borders of Europe and urged a rapid welcome into the EU community.
“We are fighting against the most anti-European force of the modern world; we are defending ourselves; we Ukrainians are on the battlefield, along with you,” Volodymyr Zelensky told MEPs.
The Parliamentary speaker Roberta Metsola, reflecting the warm response of other senior EU officials, declared: “Ukraine is Europe, and your nation’s future is in the European Union.
“States must consider, promptly, as a next step, granting long-range systems and the fighter jets you need to protect the liberty too many have taken for granted,” Metsola said.
After his address, Zelensky joined the 27 leaders of the EU member states as the special guest at their regular summit, invited by the president of the European Council to make an opening address.
“I am thankful for your steady support of our country and our aspirations, our aspirations to live in a free, united Europe,” he told them after receiving a warm response as the leaders gathered for a group photo.
Zelensky urges faster arms supplies
However, he also warned the leaders that Ukraine needs to receive artillery, munitions, modern tanks, long-range missiles, and fighter jets “faster than the aggressor” to prepare for what he said would be a dangerous new offensive.
Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas remarked: “It’s essential that we expedite military assistance to Ukraine. I think all of us looked in the warehouses at what we have. However, we should do more.”
The EU powers of Europe and NATO have been, along with the US, the principal backers of Ukraine’s beleaguered defenders since President Vladimir Putin’s Russia initiated a full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022.
Leaders from the EU will tout the 67 billion euros ($72 billion) they have utilized on military and financial aid to Kyiv, comprising funds spent on hosting four million Ukrainian refugees.
The Lugansk regional governor in eastern Ukraine warned that Moscow was attacking Ukrainian forces near the town of Kreminna and “systematically destroying” three nearby communities.
“For the offensive, we need more armored vehicles and ammunition,” he said.
Meanwhile, Moscow says Russian forces were advancing on Bakhmut and Vugledar, two key fighting centers in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine, which is now the war’s flashpoint.
Updated maps of Russia are available for sale in Moscow bookstores, showing four annexed Ukrainian regions: Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Lugansk, and Donetsk. Russian President Putin regularly refers to them as “our historical lands”.
