With Bakhmut ‘best in our hearts,’ Zelensky makes impassioned G-7 plea

His spokesman Sergii Nykyforov later clarified on Facebook that Zelensky’s “no” was referring to Russia’s assertion that it has taken the city, saying Zelensky denies those claims.

But buildings have been destroyed, Zelensky said, and all that remains is ground “and a lot of dead Russians.”

“For today, Bakhmut is only in our hearts, and there is nothing on this place,” Zelensky said, while praising Bakhmut’s defenders: “They did strong work, and of course we appreciate them for their great job.”

It was a somber note as Zelensky arrived in a city that was severely damaged nearly eight decades ago by a US nuclear bomb. He came warning anew about the threats of nuclear weapons and the risks for his war-torn country that is seeking to one day rebuild in the same way Hiroshima has become a vibrant industrial hub.

Biden, in remarks ahead of the meeting with Zelensky, said the United States would supply Ukraine with another phase of military assistance, a $375 million tranche that Biden described as “a package that includes more ammunition artillery, armored vehicles to bolster Ukraine’s battlefield abilities.” “

“The United States continues to help Ukraine respond, recover and rebuild,” Biden said.

Zelensky spent much of the day in meetings but was expected in the afternoon to visit the Peace Memorial Park, the epicenter where the atomic bomb was dropped in 1945, and hold a news conference in the evening. Throughout the day, he received hugs, handshakes and pats on the back.

“Together with all of our allies and partners, we have achieved such a level of cooperation which ensures that democracy, international law, and freedom are respected,” he wrote on Twitter amid his meetings, “There have been attempts to ignore and disregard what we value. But now it is impossible. Now our power is growing.

He called for keeping democracies united.

“The more we all work together, the less likely anyone else in the world will follow Russia’s insane path,” he added. “But is this enough? Democracy needs more. I think we need the clear global leadership of democracy. This is the main thing that we provide with our cooperation.

Later in the day, he wrote an emboldened message stating that Ukraine won’t negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin until troops are withdrawn.

“As long as invaders remain on our land, no one will sit down at the negotiating table,” Zelensky wrote. “The colonizer must get out. And the world has enough power to force [Russia] to restore peace step by step.

In the morning, Zelensky met with other leaders at a hotel. They posed for photos briefly, with Zelensky leaning over to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and saying, “Thank you.” After about a minute of rearranging themselves and posing for photos, Biden came over to Zelensky, draping his arm around him and speaking into his ear as they left the room.

During a later meeting, Zelensky was notably seated next to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has remained neutral about the war.

“The Ukrainian situation, and the international community, is faced with challenges over peace and stability,” Kishida said to start the meeting. “How can we respond to these challenges? I hope we can deepen our discussion on those topics.

Before the discussion began, and before Zelensky spoke, reporters were ushered out of the room.

Zelensky met with Biden on Sunday afternoon, a discussion that came a few days after the Ukrainian president won a significant victory when White House officials said they would allow allied nations to send F-16s to Ukraine and that the United States would train Ukrainian pilots. That decision, a significant reversal after Biden had maintained that the fighter jets were unnecessary, came after Zelensky had for months requested the advanced aerial capabilities to bolster his country’s counteroffensive.

The shift was the result of extensive discussions among White House officials and diplomacy with allies around the world.

In the weeks leading up to the G-7 summit, national security adviser Jake Sullivan traveled to London, in part to iron out the details of the F-16 issue, according to US officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private deliberations. . While there, he met with European officials, including the British, French and Germans, to discuss the logistics of training the Ukrainians, and the Dutch and the Poles to discuss the potential delivery of the fighter jets. The trainings are likely to take place in Europe, US officials said. The Netherlands and Poland have F-16s, making them central to the effort to provide Ukraine with them.

Upon returning to Washington, Sullivan briefed Biden on the discussions and the broad support among US allies to give the planes to Ukraine. That paved the way for Biden to tell his G-7 counterparts at the summit that the United States would support training Ukrainian pilots, paving the way for countries to eventually send F-16s to Ukraine.

Zelensky’s trip, which had been kept under wraps until the day before he was to arrive, has immediately become the most dominant theme for a summit that was also designed to focus on climate change, combating China’s economic and military rise, and coming up with international standards for rapid advancements in artificial intelligence.

He landed late Saturday afternoon, dressed in his signature army green, and walked down the stairs of a French plane to board a waiting motorcade. Riding through the streets of Hiroshima, with police officers standing at nearly every corner, he arrived for several meetings with foreign leaders.

One of his first was with Modi, the first time the two have met since the war began.

In his remarks, Modi said he would do everything he could to find a solution to the conflict: “For me, this is an issue of humanity and humanitarian values. You would know the challenges and pain of war more than any of us”

He held conferences overdue into the night time with each most sensible chief right here, together with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

Zelensky launched an upbeat video overdue on Saturday to the electorate of his nation, calling his conferences hopeful and productive.

“As always, I am thankful to our warriors,” he stated. “To everyone who protects the Ukrainian land, the Ukrainian sea and the Ukrainian sky. We are sure we will return from this visit with even greater opportunities for you, our defenders.”

It was once Zelensky’s first discuss with to Asia to mobilize for the conflict, however he has traveled broadly this month to check out to stay the world group at the back of Ukraine’s struggle, together with visits in fresh weeks to capitals in Germany, France and Britain.

Zelensky’s look on the casual grouping of the arena’s biggest economies — which incorporated Russia only a decade in the past — confirmed how a lot the geopolitical panorama has shifted within the aftermath of Putin’s invasion. Russia was once kicked out of the gang, prior to now referred to as the G-8, in 2014 after Moscow’s unlawful annexation of Crimea.

Now, the leaders of the rest seven nations have banded in opposition to Russian aggression yet again, and this weekend, leaders sought to persistently enhance that message.

Despite a leaky lead-up, Zelensky’s assembly with Scholz in Berlin culminated with a promise to supply Ukraine with air protection methods and extra tanks, Then got here a marvel go back and forth to Paris, the place Macron introduced that armored cars and lightweight tanks could be headed to Ukraine. During Zelensky’s UK discuss with, Sunak stated Ukrainian forces gets “hundreds” of missiles and drones; London additionally introduced to assist different nations through sending fighter jets to Ukraine.

Ukraine may also proceed delivery grain world wide after a NATO- and Turkey-brokered deal to increase a Black Sea initiative between Kyiv and Moscowan settlement that provides Zelensky’s country an financial lifeline.

The Mideast international relations persevered Friday, when Zelensky stopped in Saudi Arabia to request extra enhance from Arab League leaders, That assembly incorporated Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who was once attending for the primary time since being suspended from the gang 12 years in the past after his crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators prompted a perilous civil conflict.

Not each construction has long gone Zelensky’s manner this month.

Although injury from a midweek missile strike at the US-provided Patriot air-defense device was once repairedassaults on Kyiv had been one of the crucial heaviest in monthsprompting in a single day sirens and unnerving capital citizens whilst their president was once touring to shore up enhance.

Amid his efforts to safe extra the help of Asian allies, Zelensky additionally met Sunday with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, whose nation sits on an enormous provide of artillery shells that Ukraine says it desperately wishes and has confronted sustained force from Western nations to ship deadly guns at once to Kyiv.

Zelensky introduced on Twitter that he thanked Yoon for South Korea’s humanitarian and nonlethal help and that he seemed ahead to “continued cooperation.”

South Korea has declined to this point to provide deadly guns to the conflict effort, bringing up its considerations over its dating with warring nations. Seoul has been cautious of riding Moscow nearer to Pyongyang, out of fears that Russia would retaliate through serving to North Korea advance its nuclear and guns techniques. US officers have stated that Russia is already offering meals and different commodities to North Korea in go back for guns.

Zelensky and Kishida are set to fulfill Sunday night time for the primary time since Kishida’s march go back and forth to Ukraine as the general G-7 chief to make the trek to Kyiv to turn enhance.

At the time, Zelensky referred to as the Japanese chief “a truly powerful defender of the international order and a longtime friend of Ukraine.”

In a information convention concluding the summit Sunday, Kishida stated that it was once “truly worthwhile for the G-7 to have invited President Zelensky to Japan to show the G-7′s unwavering solidarity with Ukraine.”

Kishida stated through inviting Zelensky, the leaders had been ready to ship a “strong message to the world” about their enhance for Ukraine and their condemnation of Russia’s invasion.

“Wherever in the world, attempting to unilaterally change the status quo by force can never be accepted,” he stated.

Nick Parker contributed to this document from Washington.