"Ukraine is grateful to every country that helped it, but our contribution to common security also deserves gratitude", President Volodymyr Zelensky told Ukrainian ambassadors working abroad.
Volodymyr Zelensky with Andrzej Duda
On Wednesday, the President of Ukraine in Uzhgorod, near the border with Slovakia, made a statement at a meeting with Ukrainian ambassadors.
Ukraine knows how to be grateful and thank every country, absolutely all people, every nation that has helped us. But our contribution to common security also deserves gratitude," said Volodymyr Zelensky.
According to him, "to stop Russia from rebuilding its empire is to save the freedom of nations that are within the reach of Russian military columns."
"Russian military power, which was destroyed by the Ukrainians, will no longer kill in Europe, Asia or anywhere else in the world", he said.
Zelensky noted that "elections will be held in various countries in the coming months, which creates a certain difficult situation. We need understanding that goes beyond the political domestic situation."
- As ambassadors of Ukraine, you have to cool emotions when they are too high in the politics of your neighbors. You have to cool them down, but not be mute, he stressed.
The Polish Ambassador to Ukraine, Bartosz Cichocki, was summoned to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in connection with the statement of the President's Minister Marcin Przydacz, who stated that Ukraine should show greater gratitude for the help provided to it by Poland.
The Ukrainian side assessed that suggesting a lack of gratitude is unjustified and untrue, which in turn resulted in inviting the representative of Ukraine in Poland to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Commenting on the decision of the authorities in Kyiv, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that "such mistakes should not happen".
The head of the government added that given the enormous support that Poland has given Ukraine, such mistakes should not happen and stressed that the authorities "will always defend Poland's good name" and "the interest of any other country will never be above the interest of the Republic of Poland".