Speeches

“God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved.” These words are inscribed here, above our Oranta, in our great Saint Sophia. And these words are endowed with extraordinary strength – a strength we have felt for more than fifteen hundred days of the battle for life, in which our Ukraine, our capital, our people, and our faith remain unshaken.

I am grateful to everyone working for the exchanges: our entire Coordination Headquarters team and intelligence services, the Security Service of Ukraine, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, of course, the army, and most of all, every Ukrainian unit on the front line that ensures the replenishment of the exchange fund for Ukraine. Your courage, warriors, is the guarantee that we will be able to bring our people home.

We got through this winter thanks to all our people who work for our state, for their communities, thanks to the professionals in energy companies and municipal services. I want to thank you all. Business also performed well – supplies, logistics.

Today, the United States has turned to diplomacy in the situation around Iran, and the world supports this. A ceasefire always creates more space for diplomacy and should precede a genuine end to the war. Ukraine has always approached this war – Russia’s war against Ukraine – from the same position.

Here in Ukraine, we are doing our part of this work – consistently – and our long-range sanctions continue to be very effective and are actually reducing Russian revenues, primarily oil revenues. This is entirely fair, and most importantly, it limits Russia’s ability to drag out this war.

I signed a decree that provides you with more real opportunities to defend our entire state – all of Ukraine and our Crimea – all our people and the Indigenous people, the Crimean Tatar people – our security and your security, our right to live freely on our land.

We are already preparing for the next winter and gradually restoring what Russian strikes destroyed this past winter. Resilience plans have been approved across the country – for every region. Implementation has already begun.

Ukraine openly made this proposal to Russia. Russia responds with “shaheds” and continues its terrorist operations against our energy sector and infrastructure.

Ukraine’s experience in defense is a real security guarantee for Europe. So I propose that we work together to modernize our defense.

We need far more determination, far more pressure on Putin and Russia, and far more real actions and steps that bring the victory of peace and justice closer.