By Janet Ekstract
ISTANBUL- On Thursday, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky appealed desperately again to Western leaders to provide Ukraine with proper air defense systems. Speaking on Ukrainian TV, Zelensky warned that it will be Western leaders’ moral defeat if Ukraine does not receive advanced weapons. As he commented: “We still have no missile defense. We do not have enough fighter planes.” The Ukrainian president reiterated: “We shall call even louder on certain Western leaders and remind them that this will be their moral defeat if Ukraine does not receive the advanced weapons that will save the lives of thousands of our people,” He added: “Russian missiles are not going to be defeated by certain hunting guns that they are trying to sell us sometimes.”
Zelensky’s appeal came in the wake of a new, deadly attack in Mariupol on a theater that was being used by 1,300 people as a shelter from bombs and shelling but was bombed Wednesday with a majority of people still under rubble as rescue efforts continue. So far, only 130 people were able to be rescued. Zelensky who spoke on Ukrainian TV said rescue operations continue at the site despite difficulties.
Meanwhile, earlier on Friday, officials from the Donetsk region and Kyiv said they had no further update on the number of people who survived the attack. On Thursday, Ukraine’s Human Rights Commissioner Liudmyla Denisova reported that there was no update on figures released. In a new development, on Friday, Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki speaking at a news conference in Warsaw, revealed that Poland plans to submit a proposal at next week’s NATO summit in Brussels for a peacekeeping mission in Ukraine. Morawiecki commented: “Poland is very active in this forum, both in NATO and in the EU and we are the ones who urge them to take the following steps.” He added: “When the bombs are falling closer and closer to the Polish border, we will, of course, use this as an argument, both in the context of the most argument presented by (Ukrainian) President Volodymyr Zelensky as well as the arguments formulated by us during our mission in Kyiv.”
