On the anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has compared his country’s current defence against a Russian invasion to Ukrainian efforts to defeat Nazi Germany.
“Eighty years ago, millions of Ukrainians fought to defeat Nazism forever,” he said in a video message recorded during his Wednesday visit to the town of Yahidne in the northern Ukrainian region of Chernihiv, the scene of an alleged Russian war crime in 2022.
“But today Ukrainians are once again standing against the evil that has been reborn, has come back and wants to destroy us again.”
In March 2022, the Russian occupation in Yahidne locked more than 350 villagers, including 80 children, in the basement of the school for weeks. The case is documented not only by Ukrainians, but also by international media organizations. Zelensky said that 10 people had died in this confinement and a further 17 had been killed.
For him, the events show what Russia is like under its president, Vladimir Putin. “If this is not Nazism, what is it?” Zelensky asked in the emotional video.
The Ukrainian army liberated Yahidne at the end of March 2022, Zelensky said. He saw this as a sign that history could repeat itself, as in the victory over the Nazis: “Everyone who has come to destroy us will eventually flee Ukrainian land.”