Ukraine's Permanent Representative to the UN revealed Russia's "bloody arithmetic" of attempts to seize Donbas
Kyiv • UNN
To seize Donbas, Russia will need another 1.5 million troops. Ukraine rejects the Kremlin's pseudo-negotiation tactics and will not leave a single millimeter of its territory.
Russia is suffering significant losses for every square kilometer of occupied land and is resorting to "pseudo-negotiation tactics," but Ukraine will never abandon a single square millimeter of our land, said Ukraine's Permanent Representative to the UN Andriy Melnyk during a UN Security Council meeting on March 20, writes UNN.
Details
Ukraine's Permanent Representative, as noted in the UN report from the meeting, emphasized that Moscow is suffering a military defeat. According to battlefield estimates, the Russian Federation is currently losing an average of 254 soldiers "for every square kilometer of Ukrainian territory it still manages to occupy," he said. Given this "bloody arithmetic," he said that, reportedly, "Moscow will have to send at least another 1.5 million soldiers to their deaths to seize the entire Donbas."
"Even for Putin, for whom the value he places on the lives of his own citizens seems to be less than a penny or a ruble, such a figure would be catastrophic," he noted.
Therefore, the Kremlin has resorted to "pseudo-negotiation tactics," demanding Ukraine's voluntary withdrawal from certain regions as a prerequisite for peace talks, he added.
But "we will never, ever abandon a single square millimeter of our land, and we will never, ever abandon any of our fellow citizens," he said.
Against the backdrop of peace talks being frozen for almost two months, he called on the UN Security Council, particularly its European members, to adopt a resolution that would establish an "immediate and unconditional ceasefire," as well as an exchange of prisoners of war on an "all for all" basis.