Ukrainian President calls on US to increase military presence in the country
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky recently gave an interview to the American television channel CNN, in which he emphasized that there is no such thing as the US "leaving" Ukraine and called on Washington to increase its presence in the country.
 |
| Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelenskiy. Photo: AFP |
During the interview, a CNN reporter asked Zelensky if he was afraid that "the US would leave Ukraine." Specifically, the journalist raised the hypothesis that the US would withdraw its troops from Afghanistan and leave the allied government without anyone to support it.
“I don’t think we can compare Ukraine and Afghanistan like that. Ukraine is not as dependent on the United States as Afghanistan was,” he said.
According to the Ukrainian leader, "it is impossible to capture a geographically large country like Ukraine, a country with such a large population in four, five or seven days."
At the same time, the American journalist noted to Zelensky that he had not yet answered the above question, and recalled the words of the Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolai Patrushev, who said that Ukraine was heading towards disintegration, and the United States at certain moments would not remember its supporters in Kiev, as well as in Kabul recently.
In response, the Ukrainian President specifically noted that Russia "has one of the most powerful armies in the world" and Ukraine, "to the extent possible, is now independent of any other economy." According to him, there can be no question of the United States "leaving" his country and, on the contrary, Washington should increase its presence in the country.
Also in the interview, Zelensky mentioned US President Joe Biden's support for Ukraine's aspirations to become a member of the North Atlantic Alliance.
“He said: 'I think you should be there (in NATO), but it's not just up to me,'” the Ukrainian leader quoted Mr. Biden as saying during their meeting in Washington on September 1.
