Ukraine “will lose the war” if the United States Congress does not approve military aid to assist it in resisting Russia’s invasion, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Zelensky’s warning, his harshest since the war began more than two years ago, comes as Congress has for months refused to enact a package of aid for Ukraine, leaving Kyiv to deal with manpower and ammunition shortages.
“It’s important to specifically address the Congress: if the Congress doesn’t help Ukraine, Ukraine will lose the war,” Zelensky said on Sunday, April 7 during a video meeting of the Ukrainian fund-raising group UNITED24.
“If Ukraine loses this war, other countries will be attacked. This is a fact,” he said.
In February, the US Senate passed a $95.3 billion foreign aid plan that included help for Ukraine and Israel, but House Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to allow a vote on the package for Ukraine.
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Zelensky previously told CNN that “millions” of people might die in Ukraine’s conflict with Russia if US senators do not accept the aid package.
When Russia launched its invasion in February 2022, it expected to conquer Kiev in days and the rest of the country in weeks.
Ukraine successfully resisted Russia’s initial attack on its capital and returned some of the territory it had taken in 2022.
Since then, the frontlines have mostly remained steady, with Russia occupying around one-fifth of Ukraine’s territory.
Despite hopes that the country would recapture more of its occupied regions, its counteroffensive in the summer of 2023 failed to seriously breach Russia’s defences.
Also on Sunday, Zelensky warned that “in the coming weeks Russia will be more and more insistent on dragging nuclear weapons into the debate, threatening, playing with this matter.”
A Gentle Reminder: Every obstacle is a stepping stone, every morning; a chance to go again, and those little steps take you closer to your dream.
Nnamdi Okoli
