Original subtitles

There was a family in Cherson with a child.

23 days old. Killed.

Are you fucking insane?

Are you in a human?

How can you want to justify this?

I don't understand.

What is the justification?

Don't stop because Putin will come.

It's so inhuman to write those articles that Russia burn.

What is the price for that?

He has denied at least five pistols.

He will continue this war as much as possible.

What is one with you people?

So many people want Russia to collapse more than they want to save Ukraine.

Is president silence a bigger obstacle to peace than President

Putin?

Meeting on

the Common

Daily die on the sixth as Strasbourg.

There is tradition.

Start with a auch das Europaische Parliament.

Einen seiner sits hot.

Heute mitte einer centrist Frau die in Ukraine.

Zentrum der matched site

war see

deals. John.

See how.

Und for almost.

As medium

and President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Julia mendel I switched to English so that you understand.

Thank you for having me. Thanks for being here.

Thank you.

Yeah, I'm very interested and very curious what you have to say.

We are here in Strasbourg.

You're planning a speech tonight.

Why are you doing this?

I'm doing this because I cannot stay silent.

Because I feel that silence is my personal sin.

Because if I can do something to to push for peace, then I need to do this.

Sometimes, you know, people feel obligation, and this is my moral obligation.

I know that many people accuse me of,

you know, having millions and billions flowing for this or that.

I'm, you know, working for someone.

But I would surprise them because I'm sure that intelligence will find nothing.

I have been working with Western companies for a long time,

and now I live in the West, and I know that so many Ukrainians want peace.

And I know that my word meant something for that for them,

and they thanked me a lot.

I get messages from Western Ukraine, even from the regions

that are considered to be nationalist leave and Ivano-Frankivsk from Donbas.

I have a lot of friends from Donbas.

I'm from her son, which is under constant shelling from Kyiv, you know, and people want peace.

But as we see from today's situation,

it is very difficult to talk about that because,

there is the part

of the society in the West that even doesn't want to listen to it.

For instance, I just now I arrived

from the European Parliament where my access was bent.

So I'm having a speech today where a video conference

because, you know, I was banned without any reason.

They went out and they said sorry, it was taken.

The decision was taken by Mrs.

Mazzola, the head of the European Parliament.

And you're bent. So the speech will be there.

I know that there are a lot of people who are interested to hear it, but most important

for me is that I have Ukrainians who are keep writing, endorsing, calling,

saying thank you, and I feel a moral obligation to do that.

Why are you banned? What did they tell you?

What's the explanation?

No reason, which is very interesting. No reason.

So they said maybe we will try to learn the reason.

And I asked them to send the reason to via email, for instance, to,

to IFD or to me, but no reason up to now, which is very ridiculous.

And to me it shows

that they fear, I know that followed them the A landscape.

For instance, as a PR manager he is very much afraid of the word of truth.

He knows the power of the word, and it feels like

the Parliament is also afraid to hear that truth.

I have no connections to Russia.

I'm very transparent about that.

The only connection I have,

perhaps with the producer of Kenya Sobchak, which I denied to have the interview with.

So it's, it's insulting to befriend.

I mentioned in my German introduction that you have been a journalist.

You worked for very prestigious newspapers, the New York Times, political, the website,

and then you got this post.

As the speaker of President Zelensky, you worked together with the president

from 2019 to 2021,

and you have been as a close associate.

You have also written books about your experiences.

And since a few days, you as a former close associate of the president,

you have been sanctioned just a few days after your 40th birthday.

If you are allowed to say thank you.

Yeah, I mean, that's another story, very recent.

Could you explain that? Sanctioned for what?

How did you learn about it?

I learned about this from the media, but I knew from my contacts inside the government

that after my interview with Tucker Carlson, they were making so-called

linguistic expertise for you to understand what it is.

It is a very corrupt and nonobjective practice inside the Ukrainian government.

Linguistic expertise.

So they're like, they're like, it's raining.

Your words, what you're using. Yes. And,

they try

to prove this linguistic expertise that what I said at Tucker Carlson's show

is similar to Russian narratives or Kremlin narratives.

Something like this.

And I was expecting a treason charge.

That's what they will try to to prove that I am a traitor.

But instead I decided they could not go with treason.

It was not enough of linguistic expertise.

So they decided to make sanctions and they imposed sanctions.

Vladimir Zelensky, just before I was going to have this speech,

and perhaps the sanctions became the reason, justification for Mrs.

Mazzola to ban me from speaking in the European Parliament.

The sanctions are done against many people in Ukraine about against critiques,

against political opponents, against those people who are considered to be disloyal.

And they are totally unconstitutional.

Even one member of Parliament yesterday gave the interview.

He was not supportive of my speeches,

but he also said that it's not legal to impose sanctions on me.

And he is a lawyer.

So right now we are suing the government.

We have high chances to cancel those sanctions.

And if I succeed, then it means that many others will be able to succeed too.

However, I'm not idealist.

Volodymyr Zelensky controls the courts today and it will depend on the court.

Actually.

Are they more afraid of the landscape, or are they so much suicidal

that in these policies and fragile situation today, they will support those sanctions?

And what does it mean for you personally?

So you cannot reenter Ukraine.

You're from your band, from oh, going home or.

I don't think that I can enter Ukraine after talking Carlsen's interview because,

like recently we had people who were entering Ukraine

and they were stopped and there was a direct call to security service in Kyiv.

And if I cross the border, I mean, it's really very dangerous.

I'm really afraid. So what would happen?

Anything like, for instance, I suspect that my husband would be sent

to their front lines security service, which is our house and his apartment and,

everything that is there and goes to my family.

I mean, it's a lot of things I cannot talk about this pressure, but

pressure is there and it's huge and it's dangerous and it's like live matter.

So I believe that this government has crossed the border with life and death.

And I'm I know about some deaths that were very strange.

And people from security service were revealing to me

that they were politically motivated and they really are very strange. So,

of course there is a huge campaign against me, dirty campaign.

And now because of the sanctions, I cannot use my bank accounts.

I cannot sell by anything.

No investment, no financial operations in Ukraine at all.

At the same time, what is also Boris and

I will

make an appeal to, to meet a company and to ax.

They want to ban my accounts from Ukrainian audience, which is a big sign.

You know, that they're afraid of what I'm saying because recently I started publishing video

for Ukrainian audiences and they got like really millions of views, hundreds, thousands, millions.

And they they get so much support, like enormously supported.

And so, so it means, you know, every Ukrainian who starts speaking

and there is the dialog already and the support, they are banned from each other.

I have a girl here. She came to support me.

She's a blogger and she says she has been restarting her pages

one by one and her TikTok is banned, her Instagram is banned

and obviously television doesn't show another opinion.

Television is totally controlled by Zelensky's office and they keep selling the people.

The idea that the war is never ending and we need all to get accustomed to it.

Online media are under pressure.

I'm not saying that they are bad or whatever.

There are those who try to stay independent.

However, there is a huge pressure,

you know, the editors also can be sent to the front line forcefully.

And, you know, some can be banned from statements or from access.

And a lot, a lot of things are happening.

So so Instagram, Facebook, a telegram, they say the social media,

our only hope of communication and sanctions

include three links to my social media accounts that need to be banned.

But still, the people can receive your message in Ukraine or it's all blocked already.

Not. Not yet.

Do you expect that.

They they requested.

So the minister of the procedure is after sanctions, Minister of culture requests.

And we have a representative of Facebook from Ukrainian site

who is very nationalist and collaborates with the government of Ukraine.

So I don't expect that acts account will be banned because the lone mosque is promoting

freedom of speech.

But yeah, Facebook meta in this case is not objective.

So I expect that those accounts.

Can mean for you

personally, it must be very crazy because your your parents are still living in Ukraine.

They're in the occupied or liberated territories.

From which perspective, you argue, do you still have contacts with your parents?

What do they say about the whole situation?

We we had this discussion that it's better that I don't talk about that.

Okay. So let's talk about you.

And I mean, there are so many aspects we we can we can touch upon.

Very first, the obvious question, how how did it come about that

you could become the press secretary of the, of the Ukrainian president?

So at that moment I was a communications consultant for the world Bank.

And I knew a lot of about how the reforms have been developing since 90s.

I was consulting people who were working in energy sector, banking sector, you know, etc.

and I knew a lot.

And I was also a freelance writer for The New York Times.

So I knew another side to and,

well,

Zelensky did not treat me as an important person.

And as far as I understood later, they just made some kind of,

joke or whatever, but they announced that they needed

for secretaries through Facebook, and they were like for thousands of applications.

And I didn't want to apply

because I thought that as every other president, he would take some crony.

But the people from the world Bank were like saying,

why don't you just apply, you know, just like he needs to be able to see you.

And I'm like,

I really didn't believe.

But at some point it was Friday. Remember?

I finished all the job. I had nothing to do anymore.

The weekend was coming and I just sent my CV.

They didn't need anything else.

You see, it happened that after this kind of a joke,

he actually organized the procedure of of selection of the press secretary because

he hired HR companies that were interviewing,

were reviewing information, checking, etc., etc.

so the next day I got a call from HR company.

We spent like 40 minutes talking about reforms at their own press, and there was another task.

They sent it to the office of the president, and task is to make video appearance

to see how I took how, you know, Ukrainian Ukrainian speaker and you know, everything else.

And then they called me and said that I was top five.

There were four other journalists.

All of them were hating me after that and pouring a lot of dirt,

which is, you know, another question to journalism.

But we had the conversation with him and his team.

It appeared, you know, it worked well for me.

And, Yeah.

And what. Can I say?

I just answered all the questions, and, I,

I never had a huge hope for Zelensky,

but I saw where policy was leading us to, and I was against those nationalist policies.

And Zelensky was promising good things.

Yeah, that is the interesting.

What's your view of President Zelensky back then?

He was coming into the office as a very unconventional star,

kind of political newcomer, and he was promising peace with Russia.

What was your personal impression of him, and what was your first impression

when you first set with him at the table?

Well, the first I sat at the table during the interview and I was interviewed, said,

oh, actually, no,

the first I met him two months earlier

because he was collecting,

he gathered journalists from foreign media outlets who working in Ukraine.

Everybody wanted exclusive interview.

He couldn't give the interview.

He didn't know how to talk to foreign media.

So he gathered us at the table.

I was there to,

I remembered that we were going out, and a few people from big said that they were not impressed.

It was really hard to understand many things

he wanted to say then, but he was very welcoming and tried to charm us.

And, that for me, was a sign that he really didn't understand how the media worked,

especially foreign media, because foreign media, you know, they had tea and they,

they don't buy this style of 95, which is his comedian group.

Right. But the Lensky really tried and,

he was very during the interview already.

Not not I'm interviewing him, but he is for the job.

He was very different.

He was

he was he was not the same as a line skill, right?

He was a winner, you know, he was explaining me.

I wasn't smiling, he was assassin like it was.

It was very, very different.

But then later when I was, I was invited to job.

The first actually think I did not meet with him.

I went with him to Brussels and the next day.

So we were traveling and actually we achieved some success, I think, with the communications.

But what my experience showed in the first months, they really didn't know much

about policies, politics or the processes that were happening inside the country.

For instance, for instance, they even didn't know that there was an American

military aid to Ukraine, which was like, what, $250 million, a big amount, right?

But they didn't know even it existed.

So when internally, we learned in August 2019

that there was a chance that this military aid is blocked,

they even didn't react because they didn't know it existed.

Yeah.

So there were a lot of these issues.

And But as a human being, I mean, if you

because we never have the chance to to really meet him closely.

Of course we know that your your picture of him, your image of him has, has, has evolved,

along the way.

But what is your first maybe what kind of.

Say I I'm a professional.

You know, I worked with this guy. I was his voice.

I agreed for that.

It was risky, but I agreed for that.

He did not trust.

He doesn't trust people easily.

So, But in January 2020, he called me, and he said

he trusted me, so I, I, I deserved that trust, you know,

and I thought, okay, this is my opportunity, you know, to influence something.

And I felt like it's not about personal liking, right.

It's about professionalism, but it's what it was always.

He is a very chaotic person.

It's like it feels like he wakes up and sees the world again, as in you want, right?

Forgetting everything that happened before that, that he doesn't put together

the facts, that he demands different things altogether.

And some ministers were coming to me saying, we don't know what to do

because this is contradictory to this.

And he puts it in one sentence and he demands that.

Or for instance, he he is emotionally really uncontrollable.

And he's such an emotional manipulator.

Unimaginable.

And you don't learn this from the one meeting, you know, or from just interview.

You learn this when you are working shoulder to shoulder.

And actually what preceptor means is that you're working

shoulder to shoulder because all other people were just meeting and going to their offices.

Right.

And I was there.

And it's like he can burst out in anger.

He he can criticize people who are not even connected to the situation.

Or he can put the mask of such cynical calls that people are really afraid.

And inside, internally, there was a lot of fear.

And I know now even some, some officials,

I don't want to say where they work, but,

even now they were like calling.

And they're saying we had a meeting.

And when he entered, like we couldn't say what we wanted because we were so much afraid

because he was he doesn't have the limits of his punishment.

You know, if you notice a lot of people who came with him to power, they in exile,

they are persecuted.

And I'm not saying that all of them are perfect.

Some maybe are corrupt or whatever, you know? But,

it doesn't matter.

It's not about corruption or it's not about law.

It's about disloyalty.

Volodymyr Zelensky, it's about criticism of him.

There was one member of Parliament who actually helped

establish relations with Belarus in March

23rd, 2022, when when Ukrainian delegations went to Belarus to meet Russians

and in in November

2024, he went out with a post saying

like short form from Volodymyr, now you need to finish this wall

and yes, you will not win knock selection, but you need to finish this bloodshed.

And he immediately was put in jail and recognized as a traitor, and he is still there

and no chance that such people can go out.

But what was the initial vision when you worked so closely

with President Zelensky when he came into office?

What was his initial vision?

I mean, one could argue, I mean, he's a politician under extreme pressure.

This might explain some of his emotional outbursts.

Or do you think it's a character question?

But but at the beginning, I mean, what kind of I mean, you worked for him.

You must have been convinced also by this post that you took it.

What was it initially? I tried, of course, because

what is different from him than and him now is that he was more human.

He really put human being in the first place.

He was still very cynical and,

he really felt like every person is expendable.

But to some extent, he really was thinking

about how it works on the ground because he was by

himself, pressed a lot, and he really needed to,

you know, work hard for his business.

And he really felt like more human.

But again, he there was this combination of contradictions.

On one hand, he was very human about the people, ordinary people.

But when it was coming to those people who came to serve,

it really felt that they are like expendable and they do not matter.

And even the fact that during this and a half years of war, we have five

ministers of defense is would prove that names don't matter.

I remember when he resigned his first government.

He didn't explain this for like three days.

And I was talking with one big organization that was completely shocked.

They said, like we signed the memorandum. How is that possible?

He committed to the reforms and he just, like, resigns all the government without no explanation.

So we came on the third day.

There was such a, you know, tsunami of outrage in the society.

We needed the response.

And he was just he was absolutely ignoring this, this demand from the society.

And when we asked him, he was so angry.

And that is his position. I don't justify myself.

I'm not only in the managing, I don't justify themselves myself.

And we said, well, but you like fired all those people, we just need something to say.

And he said, I've heard that I will fire another like bunch of them I don't care.

Like.

And we were shocked because, you know, we just had all the government's dismissed.

So like, you just hired me once.

Some positions are still empty, but you already are talking that you will,

you know, fire those two.

And we had ministers who stayed in the position like for three weeks only.

And we had such stories, just rumors.

I can confirm that, that some ministers were

people who were paying for the minister position, like for staying for a year.

And the only thing that I can say that they stayed for a year, you know, so,

it was wild.

It was very Kotick.

And this is what Zelensky is.

He's very chaotic and not strategic. Yeah.

We will talk about the president later also.

But at the time you were you were entering office.

That was a time of growing tension.

Did you see the Russian invasion coming at the time?

Was it for you a surprise?

This is a very old development. Or did you expect it?

What was your perspective from the inside?

Yeah.

So let me just remind your audience that I resigned in July 2021.

It was eight months before the invasion.

Large scale invasion.

Actually, my resignation is rightly connected to

to these negotiations.

I just first of all, I lost any hope that I could do something

with the cows that the landscape and dear Mark both were producing.

What kind of

negotiations were talking.

About what really close to my resignation earlier than I planned,

was very communication.

So, it was really very complicated already.

You know, it was clear that Putin didn't want to talk.

He didn't arrive to Paris, he didn't want to talk over phone.

Zelensky was very offended.

And he tried to provoke Putin with this entrance

to meet, you know, statements that wouldn't, wouldn't like.

Definitely. And

in April 2021, we had already

Russian forces stationed at, at the border.

And I just need to say that I never I never justify the invasion.

I think the the way to invade another country in 21st century

with tanks and occupation, it's insane and wild and it's cruel.

But I also see that from our side.

Well, there was very lack of diplomacy and he was very provoking, and

we tried really hard to, to,

to make some kind of offer that Putin

would accept to, to make the dialog.

And for this, we reproduced a statement.

It was a response to, to previous statement of Biscoff.

And I remember a person drafted it and we checked it and I needed to put it in the media.

So I called one media and I said, we are giving you

an exclusive statement and its appeal to Russia.

They wanted the interview and I'm like, we're not given the interview, but,

we you will be like among the first for the next interview.

But now we need to put the statement there.

The statement was very diplomatic, very, you know, legally correct.

And I wasn't in the office for Saturday and Sunday.

But here, Mark, you need to know this character.

This is so ridiculous.

It's very hard to believe that these people really rule.

He's a close associate of president.

He's like he's.

You know, right. And left hands.

Yes. He's now he's now under he's now under arrest.

Or he's like, he was accused of corruption just for our viewers yesterday.

But yes, I'll talk about that.

But he's a person.

And together with Zelensky they feel like organizing a media interview.

It's like the very same goal of everything they are

by the, by the way, recognizes that he's a narcissist.

So media for them, for both of them is really very important. So,

when when

those media reached the office and insisted

on the interview, he felt like it was such a big thing

for him to organize this interview, which, you know, is just a job.

But, the landscape really appreciates interviews because he's, you know, he depends on that.

And so they felt like it's an important thing to acknowledge that interview.

And they made it like very important.

But for you to understand Zelenskyy before that never gave in to you without my preparation.

And I was not there because of health issue.

And so they decided not they decided to cancel the plan of giving their the

statement, but they decided to give the interview.

And during that interview he, you know,

media was asking what they were asking and he was saying what he was saying.

He was saying things that were not,

cleared with

Western governance, with the Western partners, with the US.

So which didn't correspond to the reality, as you saw it as you read.

Since he said that he wanted to change the Normandy format,

and he wanted the UK and the US to be the part of the Normandy format,

and that was not clear, neither with the US nor with the UK.

How is that possible?

Why are you saying that? Right?

The second thing, obviously

NATO thing and also Minsk agreements.

Before that, the position of Ukraine was that

Minsk agreements work somehow, you know, and it was important because that was a

very fragile they were preserving a very fragile peace balance.

And, and, Putin was somehow already insisting that they were not working.

But for us, it was pro-Ukrainian position that, no, no, they do work.

Please don't invite us.

Like, let's let's make it work.

And he said, no, Minsk don't work anymore.

So he just like, really denied almost everything

that was worked as a fragile diplomatic position.

You're talking about. Yes.

And I read that interview.

And so he was going, you would say, in a more confrontational mode,

pushing the diplomatic agreements behind.

Yeah. He was just, you know,

his thought was flowing somewhere.

He really doesn't have this strategy.

And you might see this through this very hard war

that his strategy is for a week most of all.

And, yeah, he had those thoughts they were not agreed with

with the Western partners actually,

at the black background, a lot of bad things were happening.

Corruption cases, dismantling of reforms.

Negativity with the Biden administration, you know, and on

on this background, having this interview, you know, for journalists and for people,

I didn't mean anything, but I understood how risky it was

with Moscow and with the West.

So I actually submitted my resignation after that.

And I remember one person from the office of the president said to me, but that was good interview.

Like, I mean, normal, you know, and I said, well, perhaps it was good, but tomorrow

Moscow will ban our like, we block our dialog.

And, it just was predictable because the next day, Peskov said, there is nothing to talk about.

At the end of the day. I mean, this is the question.

Of course, nobody really debates because all the answers are clear,

especially in the European Union.

But you personally, what would be your answer?

Who is at the end of the day

to blame for this catastrophe of the Ukraine war?

What's your personal landscape?

Because both of them, what they are doing, it's in human

and both of them are destroying the Ukrainian nation.

Wouldn't and Zelensky.

I'm not taking blame from Putin because what he is doing is absolutely inhuman.

But the landscape, you know, it's just a matter of intellectual honesty

to see that he is destroying the country.

He has destroyed the democracy that we were building.

You know, he is having so inhuman approach to our men, forcing them to the front line.

He's dismantling reforms that kept our economy and our people inside the country.

Many refugees, they flee not only Putin's missiles, they flee there.

That is, Lansky has established we have political prisoners.

We have

treason cases searched enormously.

Let me just say, in 2015, there were 73 cases of,

persecution, not persecution, but conviction

in different crimes against foundation of National Security. 73.

And in 2025, over 1000 people was already jailed for

just high treason and 3500 cases of high treason were opened.

I mean, this enormous surge, many of these people, they call for peace.

Many of these people, they go against corruption. So,

freedom of speech is very limited, the voice endless.

There is no solution to it.

People are dying.

People are fleeing.

There is a huge degradation of human capital,

shortage of doctors, no normal education for many families.

For millions of families, Ukraine has turned into a cage.

It's like four and a half years of closed borders.

It's unimaginable.

Men are fleeing through mountains and through rivers and die.

Their our own services pull out bodies from the river, find them.

You know, in the mountains we have all Instagram of men

showing how the routes, how they're fleeing the country.

I mean, look at this.

I believe that no European leader, no,

the European leader would ever agree for this to have their country going through such a horror.

So my point is Putin started this.

Zelensky continues it with support of some Western leaders.

But I mean, let's put ourselves in his shoes.

I mean, what can he do?

He has been attacked by an invader, as you describe it.

It was a it was a brutal attack.

The tanks were coming.

They were shooting. Now he's defending his country.

I mean, he's he's the country's events.

He's not defending. He is destroying it.

Look, he wasn't the one who defended Kyiv.

There were people who were defined.

He was hiding and recording videos.

And from the information that I know, he was, like, demanding to blow up the bridges,

having our soldiers on the other side, which people denied to

do, he was demanding to blow up metro station.

I mean, it was just fear extrapolating and panic extrapolating right now.

How can he be defend in the country if people are collecting

their miserable salaries still for soldiers

uniforms, for food, you know, for everything.

Because frontline is like in everything.

It's not him who is defined in the country.

These are people who are helping and people who are standing in the trenches.

So what does landscape could do?

For my information from multiple contexts, he has denied at least five pistols,

at least five deals, and one of the first ones was in March 2022. And

yes, everything changed after Boris Johnson.

Why? What's your explanation?

I mean, you say he actually should have signed these deals.

Why didn't he do it?

Okay, so I talk to two people who were at the negotiations table,

and both of them were that the position changed after Boris Johnson came.

And that was also publicly said by one Ukrainian top official.

But, you know, just yesterday.

Or is Johnson just walk into a room and tell the Ukrainian president, come on, forget this piece.

I don't accuse Boris Johnson because why would you know?

Anyone can say anything to a leader.

The leader chooses by himself, right?

There's responsible at. The end.

But here is Zelenskyy.

He was,

he was addicted to this fame.

He had like over 90% of the proof people were behind him.

There were red carpets everywhere. You know, he,

In April.

I'm sorry.

In April, almost all of the money in April, first schemes started of money laundering.

And that means that he knew about some of the schemes before

the money was out of the budget.

So this puts me in the doubt that he is not guilty.

So now, you know, he really preserves all the power in the country.

He denies any kind of elections that he cannot win.

He has all this fame, international fame, and his friends

own drone companies that use billions of Western taxpayers money.

But just like let me say, I'm not against the military aid.

The thing is that this military aid doesn't help Ukrainians to protect them.

This guy is open.

9 to 3% of Ukrainian shelters are not ready to protection.

Civilians are just open.

Just it's just a matter of luck.

Are they alive or not?

And this is very painful. And the landscape keeps, you know,

there are billions going into those companies, billions going to.

Do you think he sincerely believes that his army,

with all the support, can push the Russians out,

can defeat the Russians a nuclear power?

I was talking to a person who communicates with him

and who has known him for dozens of years.

And this person told me that

both Volodymyr and Elena know that they wouldn't be able to defend Donbas

and that Russia will take it, earlier or later.

But when we talk about Donbas, we always forget that while standing for Donbas

we also lose parts of Kharkiv region.

Sumer region in region was.

So we're losing other regions too.

So, the matter, it's

just for him a political suicide to finish this war.

He will continue this war as much as possible, and he will not take responsibility

for losing land or, you know, for degradation of the country

in public, he continues,

accusing everyone refugees who left, men who don't want to serve.

Many refugees, who many people, actually Ukrainians flee to Russia.

Do you know the number?

No, no, I don't. Know because from the from the eastern part.

But I mean, there is we have to talk about this because

you put actually acquired a severe accusation here on the table.

Follow the money.

And could you elaborate on that?

I mean, that's a that's a rather tough thing to say.

I mean, I if I understand correctly, you are saying basically.

As an economist.

Zelensky gets gets paid for actually he's taking money.

His people are taking money.

Is that I mean, have you look for that or is that.

For anti-corruption organs to prove?

But, we had corrupt wire tapes of anti-corruption organs out.

And this was not discussed in the Western media at all.

They all banned publication days.

But we were listening to that.

And, on those tapes, for instance,

former partner of Zelensky

was discussing with them Minister of Defense, a billion of dollars a year.

I'm sorry, going to the company,

that Zelensky is widely promoting everywhere

and that indirectly belongs to this partner.

Bilan. It was Berlin.

So there are also there is public information that this company

is actually very close to the landscape, and the landscape actually promotes it everywhere.

And that since 2022, late to the end of 2023,

it got oh, I don't remember, but something over a billion or whatever.

So in general, I counted that if you publicly just figure out this or that,

at least 7 billion went to that company and it's what we can say. But.

So you you are just to get that clear, you are personally convinced

that President Zelensky is involved in these corrupt schemes you're describing.

I just you know, I don't I don't like answering this correctly.

I want your audience to hear this because.

It's a suspicion or I just want to have.

A question to the audience in this case.

And it's very rhetorical. One okay.

Almost every person who has a landscape is accused of corruption officially almost every.

And does

he not know about that or does he know that and benefit?

What is worse, I don't understand.

And at the end of the day, he's responsible for his government.

That means I mean, he should know whether his people are corrupt or not.

Everyone right now, almost everyone.

So you think silence is in there to what's your personal suspicion?

It's an opinion you.

Can't you like if a person goes around the world and gives investment from one company all only,

and I know from other companies that they are banned from international marketing,

they're not allowed to market them internationally.

And that he goes and has these three companies that he tries to sell for investment.

And then we have wire tapes where he's close partners

who have known him for tens of years, discuss billions into this money.

I mean, it's it's a very, very, very visible connection, don't you?

One of his business partners had to flee the country.

That's exactly him. Yes. Yeah, right.

But there are a lot of people who fled the country.

Let me go back to the to to the development of your image, of your perception of president.

Silence.

Oh my God.

So tired.

No no no no no no no. That's it. Because that's interesting.

You have to understand the people here, they got this

kind of Hollywood picture of the Ukrainian president.

Of course, I have to be to counter your views because you understand.

And now you wrote the book back in 22.

I think it was a huge success, a huge success.

You describe.

Success, not huge. Yeah. It was it was a success.

Yeah. And

you described President Zelensky

as a meritocratic, as a hard working person

who brought fresh air into this whole office.

In the

before mentioned discussion with Tucker Carlson, you described

Presidency Lensky as a dictator, as a,

you know, a guy hysterical.

He's emotionally uncontrollable.

When did you personal perception change?

What was the crucial event or episode?

It was that that brought this change about.

It was not just the personal perception.

It was more about if I dared to speak.

First of all,

this book is more about Ukraine.

If you read it, it's about language, it's about society, it's about development,

it's about reforms.

But of course, there was a landscape and there was no too much landscape.

But I was positive about him because today I'm not going against the landscape personally.

Just going for peace just automatically means

that you're going against the landscape because he doesn't want peace.

That's it.

You say he's the biggest obstacle for peace.

So and I'm sure about that.

But at that moment in the book, you know, he was married, wasn't he?

He was a talented actor.

He came to power because people liked him.

And I came there because it was a great way.

It changed in 2020 when you came to power, everything changed.

Now I'm asking all the people.

It's four and a half years of war.

There are so many deaths.

There is such a destruction.

The drones are already hit in NATO countries.

How can you not change your perception?

It's for me.

It's so obvious that he denies any realistic possibility to peace.

And he is selling this maximalist idea

of a victory, which is not possible.

And it tells me that he doesn't want this piece at all.

But again, I'm an insider.

The information that I was getting it doesn't go public.

For instance, just this summer he was thinking about elections.

In September, he was thinking to organize elections, that he would control what he did.

For that, he took two biggest people who enjoyed the biggest ratings.

He invited them to the office, and he said, you need to support me

so that I'm like a leader of our lines.

And he even promised them the positions.

So, and one person said, I don't care about that.

I will do what I do.

My intention is different.

And another person said, no, I'm not going to do that.

I'm going to run if you you're making a.

And they were deciding inside the office if to run in this case because the landscape would lose.

And your mark said, you know perhaps don't run and let's continue the war for the next two years

because they absolutely sure that they got the money for the next two years of war.

So what does it tell us?

It als he tries manually to control democracy,

electoral processes, institutions, people, you know,

and he doesn't want to have this transparent elections at all.

But I know that from inside because since 2020,

he was actually aiming to manufacture elections online.

We have this state application that was designed by

one person that became famous for a month.

And and that's exactly why in July, you know, one of his allies decided

also to promote himself because he also thought that there would be elections.

So, you know, when you see what's happening behind the scene,

there is definitely absolutely convinced, in fact,

that show that he doesn't want to have peace because peace is a political suicide for him.

Even the partner of him whom we talked about on the wire tapes,

he speaks.

It's either him or Minister.

I'm sorry, but they say the war cannot be.

As soon as the war is over, the money will be over.

They say it.

It's it's in Ukrainian media.

It's open there.

It's it's transcribed and it's disgusting.

But you know what?

I was talking to foreign media, to Western media saying like, why don't you publish this?

And, nobody published that.

I don't know anyone who would publish that. Why?

There is this still

some kind of, I think, very simplistic approach

when in use rooms, people think that talking

about corruption in Ukraine is undermining Ukraine.

But what is actually undermining Ukraine is corruption itself,

and every government is corrupt.

Let's be frank, every government is corrupt.

It's just a matter of intention.

What is the government intended to do?

And of course, the difference.

Is the government intended to fight corruption or is the government is behind corruption, right?

Well, my my husband is saying that

the corruption scale today is much higher than during the Covid,

who was considered to be the most corrupt and pro-Russian president and who fled to Russia.

Because when we count what's happening, it's, it's disgusting and its enormous.

One example of the motion human

and I think unimaginable scale of corruption.

So men are hunted on the streets, obviously,

with such level of corruption and disregard of human life in.

The army.

Yes, it is regard to the human life.

People don't want to serve many.

They lost their the intention to.

So why?

Why would we serve?

There is no democracy here.

There is no democracy there. Right?

So they hunt it on the streets.

This is one of the ugliest phases of this war.

One thing that people with disabilities are taken to the front line,

people who might be like over 60, 16 year old blind people, etc..

Another thing that these people are forced either to for the front line or to pay

bribe and bribes can reach like $20,000 or like $15,000, right?

And even members of Parliament allegedly talk about that.

So only 2 or 3% of those people, by the data of Ukrainian ombudsman, get to the front line,

which is absolutely ineffective and they don't have any motivation to fight.

So and this corruption annually can reach up to $5 billion.

So I have a feeling that there is someone on the top benefiting from this hunting of man.

Right?

Because how can such corruption of such a huge scale exists in the country?

It's an imagined.

Is President Lensky a bigger obstacle to peace than President Putin?

I mean, Putin could stop.

For me personally.

And you might disagree, but yes, because I don't believe in Putin.

I believe when Western partners and from what I know,

what was discussed and some of the discussion, I know really to

the details, there were opportunities to have peace.

And it was these, these deals.

They were much better than the deals that are offered to us now.

And every next deal is worse and worse, obviously, because we lose more and more territory

and people.

But the landscape denied all of them, with even all legal interpretations that would allow us

to retain the control with time,

because he is stuck with the idea of conducting the war.

You know, like I hear that,

accusations to Pawlenty or Ryan Mittal that they are, you know, benefiting from this.

Well, but they're companies who always would benefit from any war.

They don't start wars. That's the thing.

And if they had intention to have peace, you know, there wouldn't be that kind of benefit.

Right?

So, yeah, for me personally, he is.

And, again, I'm not just a fine Putin.

I'm not admiring Putin or I'm not flattering him.

But let's be frank here, a person chooses his own power

and his own benefit, personal benefit above the nation's interest.

What do you think poutine wants?

I mean, in our narrative here, this might also be a reason why they banned you

from this parliament, which in my opinion, of course, is ridiculous

because if you had another opinion, they would roll out a red carpet.

And actually here it should be all about freedom of speech and expressing of your opinion.

But you know, the big fear in Western Europe is and the newspapers are full of it,

the Russians, first they want to swallow Ukraine, then they attack other countries.

And like in 2029,

the Russian tanks will somehow be at the Brandenburg Gate again.

Have you ever I mean, from your perspective, you're a new woman.

You have been born in Ukraine.

You have lived in Ukraine all your life.

I guess you're a Ukrainian patriot, etc.

you're not. You're not on the Russian side.

But if you analyze the Russian position, what do the Russians actually want?

What is their

their interest in this whole thing?

You actually ask a lot of different questions in. This way.

The last one will be the decisive what do the Russians were just Putin one.

Yeah.

You know, you should ask Putin what Putin. One okay.

What's your interpretation?

What he's not his spokesperson, you know,

but just this very small moment before I talk about Russia.

Russia will attack NATO.

Like, I think this is ridiculous statement that is being spread by some

how Russia, they didn't manage to conquer Ukraine would be able to attack NATO.

I mean, it's a little bit

illogical not only to me but to many. Right?

But if this is spread just when there is the discussion

of the next seven year budget here, where they want to preserve those fat defense budgets,

perhaps, you know, this is how we see follow the money right narrative.

So what Putin wants,

that's very difficult for me to answer.

I cannot justify this cruelty.

But I guess if I get what I

what we can do, that's what I'm sure we can.

We can build Ukraine.

That is a frontier between Russia and the West.

We can be neutral country like Switzerland, Austria.

We can try to repeat the scenario in Finland.

Who wants lost battles but preserve the nation and the future?

Right now we are following the Afghanistan path.

I have a friend from Afghanistan who was working for big media outlets,

and when he described that, and then I was talking to one American veteran who was there.

What they described is very much like what's happening in Ukraine,

because there was the conflict for 20 years.

During those 20 years, trillions of dollars were put into the country.

But what nobody wanted to know noticed was the degradation of the state system,

degradation of institutions, the lack of leadership

because everyone was listening what the West was saying, huge censorship

because media were put in statements instead of facts.

That's why they couldn't analyze when Kabul would fall.

And if they were criticizing the government, they were banned from the access

to the generals and to the woman.

So they they could not in many ways criticize the government.

And also, of course, there was enormous corruption that was watching everything from inside,

and that was killing the idea of the people believing in the state of Afghanistan.

And these are the things that are happening with Ukraine.

And I believe if this war continues,

we will become the vassal state because nobody.

Would.

Listen to us.

Yes, nobody would seriously listen to us.

And we are becoming so weak, weaker and weaker, weaker and weaker.

No economy, no democracy.

You know, absolutely populist PR

that I am afraid that Ukraine will lose and,

and and that Russia will become, you know, will be in keep.

That's what I'm afraid, you see. Yeah.

It's very interesting what you what you express what you said

in several interviews about these negotiations.

Let's go back to Istanbul 22, this event where Boris

Johnson suddenly flew in and everything fell off the rails.

But you said you had witness you were not there at the negotiation, but you have witness.

You have talk to people who were there.

And if I understand you correctly, you are saying that there was an agreement at the time.

They basically agreed.

I remember that President Zelensky put on Twitter a message

saying we agreed to a neutral Ukraine.

And I was surprised at the time.

So how close have we been back then?

Just a few months after the invasion started to a piece, how close did we have you been there.

Before invasion?

No, after the in Istanbul.

How close were we were at the well?

From what I understood, from the people sent me that we made the deal.

Yeah. That. Was their words, not mine.

The deal was there.

He was there. I was explained in details.

There were a lot of things that could be done for me.

When I put on one side

the lives of Ukrainians and the future of the nation.

And those things, they're not important for me at all.

Yeah.

It's it's like, you know, like for instance, let's speak about this Nate idea.

I think Nate idea, the very same Nate idea died in Ukraine because.

Native Ukraine.

No, no the very same idea of NATO at all.

Died.

For the reason that NATO was created to protect the people.

And if people are dying for the idea to be accepted in ten, 20,

50 years, it's ridiculous that it means that idea doesn't work.

You see, and there were a lot of technical details.

But even in 2025, I was talking to a person

close to the military, I cannot say the office, but close to to everything discussing.

And they said, you know, the they even couldn't say the number of troops on the ground.

It's like what you get in media.

It's such a maximalism populism that

that doesn't work and that justifies this war.

But for instance, Lenski says, we will need 800,000 troops.

Who's going to pay for those troops you like?

Where are we going to get this money?

Why would we need 800,000 troops?

Who is going to be there? People don't want to serve.

We have literally around 250, 300 000 professional military that need war.

Because they are professional military, they can be stationed there.

This is much less.

And I know that military was fine with that because we could have reserves.

Right.

But like it's been just like smashed no

vision.

He just tries to push for something unrealistic.

And just like people read this, they just accept the statement

because this is the statement from the president and they really never think about the reality.

Or let me say this one thing I really, seriously was asked by CNN

if we are going to produce nuclear weapons, and I barely loved on air.

And I was like, no, we're not.

I just know how it's been cooked, that he just demands

some kind of report that would prove that we can do something.

And they really wrote some report, but we don't have anything.

Look at North Korea.

You took him, what, 24 years to cook his first bomb.

Right.

And it was like they were still in engineering.

They were getting all the money there.

It's enormous money. Right. And and of course,

the engineering constructions.

Right. We don't have that.

We don't have.

So how long will it would it take Ukraine to have any clear bomb?

Why would we do that?

And why would we tell this to the world like 30 years earlier?

And I'm sorry, who is going to give us the necessary components for it?

No one. Right.

So it's such a ridiculous statement, but it was seriously discussed in the media.

And for us it's another escalation, right?

Because maybe Putin would believe in that, I don't know.

Putin also has his kind of very strange and logical vision.

Right. So yeah, when you read the media,

you should really try to understand how it works on the ground.

At least some analysis, at least some doubt to the statements he makes.

You said that NATO didn't deliver actually on its promise to protect the people.

One could even go further.

There are people who are saying that NATO, actually the NATO enlargement

to Eastern Europe is actually a reason for this war.

Do you accept this explanation?

Is the expansion of Naito now from the Russian perspective,

you're not Naito trying to get, you know, into Ukraine.

I mean, you could even say that that NATO

is the reason that that the Russians went crazy and get in.

Look, I definitely consider this is the problem for Russia, right?

Because they have been very serious about that for many years.

And I was reading the book of Angela merkel and he was explaining she was explaining how,

in 2000, she was the only obstacle for Ukraine to enter NATO.

And for Ukrainians, it is being sold as a trail for me.

As a as. A as a betrayal. As a betrayal. For me.

You know, she was a shield against the war, and she said that directly,

that if Ukraine is in nature, then Putin would start the war. So,

I guess it's not like what I think it's like.

What was the thought for multiple actors for a long time?

I don't think this is the only problem.

I don't think this is the only problem, but definitely that was the problem.

But again, I'll share with you.

For instance,

you perhaps didn't read there is a bestseller,

the last politician in in the United States.

It talks about Biden administration and in two places

it explains in details how the meeting with President Zelensky went on.

And, one of that was in September 2021,

when Zelensky was obsessed with the idea of NATO,

absolutely declining that

the way to NATO, that we needed reforms, you know, we needed to be prepared.

So when

they stayed alone with Biden, how is explained in the book?

The media left and the landscape didn't thank him for the support

and for everything that the United States was doing for Ukraine.

The landscape just immediately started demanding nature access,

and Biden was very shocked by this unethical behavior.

And he said he started explaining that there was no consensus for Ukraine to enter nature.

And it wasn't about his personal decision.

But for Zelensky, any decision is personal.

Anything you know is personal.

So after, you know, Biden tried to be diplomatic

and explained that we cannot enter NATO, he said,

then NATO is a very our data structure and Germany in France

would soon leave it, which caused a lot of outrage even in among those people

who were in Biden's team and who were huge supporters for the landscape.

That's exactly how you can find it in the book.

I was talking to some journalists who were explaining to me, and I know he was obsessed,

but again, to be in nature, we need market economy.

Zelensky destroyed market economy. We need reforms.

Zelenskyy dismantled reforms.

So he is, on one hand destroying the weight of NATO.

On the other hand, he is escalating his rhetoric

with maximalist vision of something unattainable entering NATO. And

how can this be justified?

And how can anyone look at this really seriously?

That's my question.

You understand I'm always have to be the advocate,

of course, because the accused is not here at the table.

President Zelensky cannot defend himself.

So I have to present I have that

defender of President Zelensky.

But it's also you made a very important point.

And this is extremely, I would say, crucial for the audience

here in Western or Middle Europe.

You are saying that there was basically an agreement there on the table?

Yes. Now, the critics would argue if you were in a German television show,

they would say, well, this is completely naive to believe that the Russians would accept.

Of course, you had such an agreement, they would have signed this agreement.

But that's just paper.

Like a few months later, poutine would have come

anyway because he wants to have Ukraine back.

He considers this part of of the Russian holy model territory, the Ukrainians.

It's not real people, it's artificial state.

It has been manufactured by some dictators.

It's a distortion.

Ukraine is not there to stay and.

Tired of this. Sure.

But I would say I mean, this is I would say this is a legitimate point.

You could say, okay, we make we sign a deal with Russia, but they will never accept it.

What would you counter?

What would you say?

Then? I will just switch to it a bit.

I will switch this.

Like if you sign now agreement with Russia, they still will attack you in a few years.

What you say actually die now?

Not to die in few years potentially.

Like how does it work?

Like I have traveled to dumbass many times alongside with the landscape.

I have covered this war since 2014.

I'm from her son. I know what is being done there.

It's inhuman.

Hell it's inhuman.

So you have to stop this immediately.

The only way to survive, it's the only way to survive.

We tried differently.

We tried sanctions.

We tried military aid.

We tried everything we could.

That's it.

That's the end.

We are done. The strategy does not work.

So my point is, we need to stop dying.

To have a chance for real diplomacy, for real diplomat to come to power.

We need to try to preserve the fragile

balance of peace for giving a hope for this nation to survive.

That's the major point.

And they say, don't sign the peace.

Die now, keep dying, because potentially he can attack again.

How do you know if he's going to attack again?

Did you talk to him? What is wrong with you people?

So many people want Russia to collapse more than they want to save Ukraine.

And I'm saying don't destroy my country.

And they say I'm pro-Russian.

You say this is ridiculous, standing for the people

who are not protected, neither from Putin nor from Zelenskyy is not.

Production and peace can not be pro-Russian.

And I see, you know, I was trying to publish an article about peace

without criticizing the landscape, just about the necessary for peace.

After the Gallup poll showed that 52% of Ukrainians wanted peace sap

as soon as possible, so I was just declined.

Okay, I published it in another media outlet.

Then in a year, I see the same media flat is publishing some London professor

who actually is justifying this war.

And I went to to to Gemini and to grok and I asked them the AI

if this professor has ever visited Ukraine

or Russia, and I was shocked to see never.

So it's a London professor in the West

who thinks that he is doing a good thing for Ukraine or for democracy.

I don't know, saying that this was justified and that Russia is about to collapse.

But these articles have appeared for 25 years.

The trust is about to collapse.

Ukraine won't exist in 25 years.

More if the war continues.

That's the major point.

And that's the reality you see.

And every point that says that we don't need to finish

this wall is actually onto Ukrainian and onto democracy.

And what you should the leaders in the European Union do.

What will be your message to them?

Should they just stop paying?

Silence, should stop delivering their weapons.

What is your message to those European leaders?

Were actually financing this whole thing.

There is no diplomacy of threats.

It just doesn't exist.

There is no diplomacy of accusations.

What I see is constant escalation of rhetoric, inability to talk to Putin.

You see today for Ukraine, for any Ukrainian to be very difficult to talk to Putin.

But if we had a coalition of Western leaders who would be able to stand for Ukraine, really?

But what we see is when Donald Trump tried to talk to Putin, he was branded for Russian.

Then there were some other leaders like Fizzle or Orban, pro-Russian, handled, criticized,

and there were leaders who really European leaders stand with Zelensky

for continuation of this war with some moral justification.

Let's return to diplomacy.

You know, keep your friends close, but enemies closer.

Be diplomats. Really.

You need to remember what diplomacy is and try

to think about security guarantees that would be acceptable.

For instance, America provided this economic

security guarantees, and I was soaking in details about that.

And I think it's a good thing because if they pour, you know, a lot of money

in construction of their factories near Dunbar's,

you know, etc., some kind of economic guarantee, right?

Someone needs to talk to Putin.

And obviously it's not the landscape.

And and someone needs to find a realistic path to peace.

And again, still legal interpretations that would allow Ukraine to return control

of the territories with time and not in military way.

I think that's realistic.

I mean, don't boss is lost. Crimea is lost.

Don't you think so?

It depends on legal interpretation and on how we build the relations.

I it's not like I, I trust or I believe

I'm not naive, but we need to try.

That's what we need to do. We need to try.

And you know, nobody talks about Armenia and Azerbaijan.

I was in Romania, by the way.

So many people there are outraged by giving the land to Azerbaijan.

Nickel Prime Minister said that's the best thing in his life he could do.

And I'm thinking he is a leader.

There are people who don't agree with giving away land.

They don't support this decision, but they also don't want war and they don't want to fight.

So land for peace could be an option. And and

so he

had people who were dissatisfied with this decision, but they stayed alive.

Or he could have people who would be with the war continuation, but they would be dying.

Right.

And I'm like, as a leader, he did a very brave decision.

And it was also supported by the European Union, as we know.

I cannot say about the land swap again because I'm talking about legal interpretations.

So in Ukraine, if you talk about that and if you recognize the necessity of that

or something like this, then you can get treason charges,

which is up from 15 years in prison.

I have I was struck when I listened.

I watched your program with Stalker Carlson.

You were coming up with some tough accusations, and now the defender of President Zelensky

again, let's go to some of these accusations again.

The dictator, I would argue.

Well, a dictator, I mean, he's in a state of war.

Even Switzerland had a more authoritarian system in the Second World War.

But, I mean, he has been elected.

I mean, and he's not pushed out of his office.

Isn't that would you still stand by this formulation?

Would you still say silence is a dictator?

I was talking to one very smart journalist and he said, perhaps autocrat as better.

Okay.

Because dictator means something like, you know, camps of death. And.

His autograph.

And the second thing you said was when Tucker Carlson asks you, well, is he taking drugs?

And then you said.

Well, to go there, people just take it.

All of us.

No, but I think I'm talking to to a former journalist.

I mean, you have worked for the New York Times for, for some very prestigious titles.

And I would say, come on.

I mean, you said, okay, I've heard about it.

It's an open secret, but I've never seen him take drugs.

I mean, well, you cannot argue like this, as.

It would be strange.

And he was inviting me to the toilet, right.

I mean, it would be, Yeah.

So I just for my book, I have already around 15 people who told me that they saw.

But I mean, from journalist to journalist, I mean, it's a rumor, basically.

And, okay.

Well, you know, that's how I responded.

And I stand for that answer. Okay.

I well, you just need to understand that I talked to people

who had known him, I thought dozens and dozens of years ago.

And, of course, I mean, you don't mind me asking this question because that's that's important.

I have to ask them because our, the readers, the people who know it will go into it.

So piece how how do we get there?

What would the if you had a discussion with President Zelensky now

let's imagine he would he would you would come to his his office.

What would be your advice to President Zelensky or do you think he's not capable of making peace?

I don't want you to put logic to Zelensky.

I hear so many people trying to put logic that there is no logic.

It's not like he's listening to advise or radio.

You know, he has his life when he's living it and his life is war.

He doesn't want advice on how to finish the war, so why would I advise?

That's the point.

Well, again, there were Istanbul,

dog agreements.

But I also know that at the end of 2022, there were some kind of agreement to.

And the landscape, like Kherson was liberated and

Zelenskyy went to the US and there should have been some kind of announcement.

I'm not sure about what, but several contacts told me that there should have been something,

and America helped us a lot with her son, including, but he just denied it.

He said, you know, we will have controversy.

We are fine with the war of attrition, which is not fine at all.

And, what I mean is,

the positions that have been discussed, they are very complicated

and difficult to accept in political way. Right.

But this war, it's not about territories.

It's, it's it's, it's it's a political war.

So it should be solved on political level.

And I'm very, very proud of my people.

I was there in 2022.

I saw how men are collected.

You know, the guns.

I was getting so many messages from the people I know who were like going

to the territorial defense.

They were lining up to the conscription offices.

It's so painful for me to understand that he killed this.

And these people, they are exhausted.

Some of them have been staying there for four and a half years without a vacation.

We have terrible stories from the front line.

You are given this money, but there are people in the front line

who drink their peace because they don't have even water.

I mean, this is terrifying.

There is torture in the conscription offices.

So my point is it's just like

not viable, this war in the form it exists.

And I'm going I'm so proud of Ukrainians that it's so much.

But now I see this huge wave.

They beg to stop it just to survive.

Like how we can how can we ignore that quote?

I don't understand.

That the narrative here is that the Russians are totally incapable of winning this war militarily.

What is your argument to that?

Russians have ten times more people,

and they have also functioning economy, which we do not have.

The European Union gives us loan after loan and we have reached already the debt,

which is equal 110% of GDP.

And Russia even didn't borrow for this war.

Again, I will

I will repeat it like we try to militarize all rhetoric.

And this is not about that.

We need to turn to to diplomacy.

This is very important.

And also I was talking to few Americans

and they told me before this escalation in summer,

a very important point, which was very cynical and I couldn't have said it publicly.

They said Russians could bomb you more.

They could destroy more of logistics, of infrastructure, of, you know, warehouses.

But they don't do that.

They want to move with diplomacy.

Again, it's not Russians who said that.

And I couldn't say that and saying this for the first time,

because then the escalation came and we really so

they destroy our fuel stations

where warehouses with food, with everyday needs,

you know, and now we have a humanitarian catastrophe looming.

And the people are afraid of winter.

They're just, you know, there is this feeling of disaster coming.

So, you know, every time, keep saying something

about Russia without talking to Russia, without talking to Russia, right?

And without even given a chance for diplomacy and for thinking differently.

And this is like a big problem.

This is a big problem. Eugene.

President Zelensky, I would like to have your opinion on that.

You mentioned the escalation.

I consider the situation extremely dangerous

because when a war escalates, you describe the rhetoric.

You know, it heats up, it heats up.

There is a lot of pressure on the Russian president.

And some people in Europe have the

the feeling that the Ukrainian president is actually purposely

trying to escalate this war

in order to draw more and more countries in it.

Is that also your view is that.

You know, there was a former Polish president who gave the interview and said

that he had a feeling that Zelensky wanted to drag nature into the conflict.

And the president who gave the interview, he justified this.

He said perhaps everyone would.

So I would completely with with agree with him.

Perhaps everyone would or

I don't know, maybe not everyone who would like to put diplomacy first and the people first.

The escalation brought disaster, complete disaster, and we had a surge of death

and wounded, for instance, in July,

in July or August, we had four.

In July we had 427 dead civilians

and over 200, 2600 wounded.

So over 3000 people suffered from direct shelling.

And it was the highest record since May 2022.

I just like don't understand why it's happening.

You know, the stories that are happening.

I mean, they're so heartbreaking.

During that month,

there was a mother in Somalia who

there was a Russian shelling, and she took out her husband from the rubble,

and she

didn't manage to take her to daughters of seven, ten years.

I couldn't live up to that.

There was a family with seven children to beat it.

There was a family in her son

with a child, 23 days old, killed.

Are you fucking insane?

Are you in a human?

How can you want to justify this?

I don't understand what is the justification?

Don't stop because Putin will come.

You see, it's like it's so inhuman to write those articles at Russia.

Bone.

What is the price for that?

What is the price for that?

Do you think this this whole thing can blow up in a, in a big war in Europe, in Western Europe.

Is that in Europe? You're out of the question.

You know, I think that she is making a lot of mistakes today

by militarized in the society and making it in a very primitive way of PR.

I don't understand this.

I think if the things need to be done and obviously people need with time

to reform their armies, you know, and to produce some weapons and they need to do this quietly.

Why do they put their plans up there?

I have no idea.

I don't think that many Westerners would like really to fight,

because it's very easy to discuss ideas when your life is not under risk.

I see, you know, there was a polling about polls.

Are they eager to fight? And no, they are not.

But I also see how many properties polls are buying in Spain and Italy, you know,

because they are just fleeing this constant escalation in conflict.

So, you know, for many Westerners, it's a Hollywood movie, and they think it's very brave

to escalate rhetoric and to tell it's

just flexing with the muscles, I would say.

And I feel it's very immature and it's very irresponsible

before they are people, because when it will come to real war

and they understand what they have done, you know, that would be bad.

But I hope, I really hope it won't get there.

I hope that the leader is now her rising, and leaders who are in power,

who will really stop this conflict and stop this constant escalation.

And silence, will not be one of them.

I mean, you use some very tough words.

I mean, there was also the comparison, I think, in one of your sayings that that he wanted to have,

like ideological talking points in the style of,

of even of, of Goebbels, this, this very dark.

I mean, this is a very harsh comparison.

I mean, he's a Jewish president.

You compared him there or brought him in this, this kind of of neighborhood.

I mean, is that is that your view of resiliency?

Is he, like, dangerous as these kind of Nazi guys in the past?

You know, I never tried to use this kind of metaphor as they are really very risky.

Like, why would I, you know, like people blame each other for Russian or Nazi or whatever.

The Russians say the Ukrainian supporters of silence are Nazis.

For example, Vladimir Solovyov, the guy in Russian television.

What do you say to this? Are there knots? Is in Ukraine?

Are these right wing guys really in the tradition of this dark period there?

What would you say? Russian propaganda has always been strong.

I don't listen to it much.

I was listening it at the beginning of the war.

But it's so

ridiculously

harsh

and we cannot build our strategies and ideology

based on what Russia sees, says or things.

So you walk with a crazy guy.

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but I mean, you will push.

But I mean, this Nazi thing, it is not available.

Has been escalating.

So what I can say, I'm not also satisfied that there is such a price

for radicalism and nationalism in Ukraine today, and militarization of society everywhere.

And it's what Zelensky's office is doing.

And actually, Zelensky uses militarization, nationalism

and radicalism for his own purposes, for for protection, let's say so.

So I don't agree with that.

But it's not representing the Ukrainian society in general.

And it's not representing Ukrainians are not radical at all.

Like it's very natural for us.

So going as far as saying about Nazi, you know, I mean, in every country,

maybe there is some small group of people who admired it.

Yeah, the right experts who investigate this.

But I think any radicalization needs to be limited.

And obviously we need to be a country that produces added value

that becomes economically attractive and that wants to return its people

and improve the demography and make the diplomatic relations around the world.

Because, as you see, you're talking about

Russia was also made a lot of conflicts with the Western countries. And,

we need just to return to sanity

where we actually need to have diplomacy with everyone to survive.

Well, we have talked about very dark things.

Thank you very much for this conversation.

But we cannot end this conversation on this rather pessimistic note.

So we have to find the silver lining.

The, the the reason for optimism.

Where do you see it?

Where is the silver lining at the moment in this terrible,

catastrophic situation for your country?

There are two reasons, I think, for to be optimistic.

It's first of all, it's Ukrainians.

I think that Ukrainians are treasure, very educated, hardworking and creative nation.

And I believe that Ukrainians is the power of Ukraine.

And the second I see the rise of those forces

who don't agree with the status quo, that's our hope.

We need to have people who would talk, who would talk about postwar Ukraine,

how to restore the country and how to return people,

how to attract them back in what was force, you know, so I stay hopeful.

And I give this interviews with a lot of risks to myself and with a lot of negativity.

But just to show that there is different Ukraine and this Ukraine

can be reliable, this Ukraine can be attractive in many ways.

This Ukraine can be neutral, and it can be a frontier of values between Russia and the West.

And to sum it all up to the Western

European audience in one sentence.

What is the essence?

What do they have to understand and what do they have to do?

Stop the war

to save Ukraine and to save Europe from the war?

Thank you very much for this conversation.

Thank you a lot. It was intellectually very tasty.