According to President Volodymyr Zelensky, mobilizing new soldiers is an expensive and politically sensitive issue for Ukraine. “The question of mobilization is a very sensitive one,” said Zelenskyj on Tuesday evening at a press conference marking the end of the year in Kiev. The army has requested 450,000 new soldiers. Additional mobilization on this scale would require around 500 billion hryvnia (12.2 billion euros). For him it is also important which of the soldiers who have fought so far will then have the right to rest and home leave. A complex plan is being developed for this rotation.
Russia has not achieved any of its war goals in Ukraine in 2023, Zelensky said. Moscow was not able to completely conquer the Ukrainian Donetsk region. Instead, Ukraine largely restored control over the western Black Sea. Ukraine has been repelling a large-scale Russian invasion since February 2022. Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday in Moscow that the initiative currently rests with his troops.
Despite the current halt in Western aid, Zelensky was also confident that both the USA and the EU would continue to support his country in the future. “I am confident that the United States will not betray us,” he said. The head of state was also optimistic about an EU financial package of 50 billion euros currently blocked by Hungary: “We will find means to preserve this 50 billion.”
Meanwhile, Zelensky clearly rejected the idea of Ukraine joining NATO without the Russian-occupied territories. Ukraine will not agree to a split accession. “We have not received such a proposal from any of our partners. I find it difficult to imagine what that would look like,” he said.
A few hours earlier in Moscow, Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin had declared failure of Western attempts to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia in Ukraine. The goal has been shattered by the “growing power of our armed forces and arms production,” Putin said at a Defense Ministry meeting in front of military officials and representatives from politics, church and society.
In the war against Ukraine, “one can confidently say that the initiative lies with our armed forces,” the Russian president claimed. In fact, the Russian army, which has suffered several defeats since the invasion ordered by Putin almost two years ago, has also made little progress for months and, according to observers, has suffered high losses.
