President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine told leaders of the European Union’s 27 member states in Brussels on Thursday that his country desperately needed their support for his “victory plan,” which he maintains could end the war no later than next year, but which it is unclear how much Ukraine’s allies will embrace.
Mr. Zelensky made the impassioned plea on his latest in trip abroad as he tries to attract sustained international support for Ukraine, two and a half years into the war, and as Ukrainian forces are steadily losing ground to Russian troops. He had hoped to present the plan to European leaders in Germany earlier in the month, but that gathering was postponed when President Biden canceled his participation to deal with the effects of Hurricane Milton.
“You all know Russia’s psychology,” Mr. Zelensky told E.U. leaders on Thursday. “Russia will resort to diplomacy only when it sees that it cannot achieve anything by force.”
Mr. Zelensky is scheduled to speak at a news conference with Mark Rutte, the head of NATO, later on Thursday and will make the case for Ukraine’s accession into the military alliance — a key point in his proposals.
The “victory plan” also calls for the West to lift restrictions on Kyiv’s use of Western-delivered missiles to strike ammunition depots and other military facilities inside Russia, and to share more satellite data that Ukraine can use to identify and strike Russian targets.
The Ukrainian leader laid out the plan for the first time in public on Wednesday in a speech to his country’s Parliament, an attempt to rally support at home around the idea that Kyiv can turn the tide on the battlefield. Ukraine is heading into what looks to be another difficult winter, with Russia stepping up its attacks on energy infrastructure.
In the past few months, Ukraine has also lost a series of cities, towns and villages in its eastern Donetsk region, currently the war’s main theater. Its forces are often overwhelmed on the battlefield by Russia’s superior numbers of troops and ammunition.
Yet Western allies are wary that Ukrainian strikes inside Russia will escalate the war, and have declined to lift their restrictions on such strikes involving their weapons, Ukrainian officials have said.
Western allies have also been unwilling to allow Ukraine to join NATO while the war continues, lest doing so pulls them into Europe’s largest land conflict since 1945. And while allies, including the United States, have continued to pledge further military aid for Ukraine, leaders like Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany have faced pressure from the public to reduce their countries’ aid to Ukraine this far into the conflict.
Mr. Zelensky told his country’s Parliament on Wednesday that Ukraine would provide “partners with a clear justification of what our goals are, how we are achieving them and how much this will reduce Russia’s ability to continue the war.”
Ukraine also hopes to convince its partners that they have concrete interests in helping fend off Russian aggression, and Mr. Zelensky said on Thursday that his “victory plan” was essential for protecting the Baltic States, Poland and the Nordic nations.
Mr. Zelensky said Ukraine was home to metals including uranium, titanium and lithium, which its allies could benefit from as competition for metal resources intensifies. He also emphasized the potential for joint arms production in Ukraine, which several major European military companies have already started or are considering.
The Ukrainian leader said that Europe’s continued support and unity were also a weapon against Russian aggression, adding, “It’s a weapon that means one thing for all of us: safety.”
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