Keep fighting, you are sure to win!: Zelenskyy urges Ukrainians

KYIV: To mark the second anniversary of the Russian invasion, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in an address on Saturday, urged his countrymen to remain hopeful of victory. In a video address recorded from the Hostomel airport, Zelensky thanked Ukrainians for their efforts to resist Russia's full-scale invasion and said, "We are 730 days closer to victory."

"Keep fighting - you are sure to win!," the Ukranian President said at the airport, which was targeted by Russia in the early days of the war. Zelenskyy said that he is "incredibly proud" of the people of his country and admires and believes in each of them.

"Any normal person wants the war to end. But none of us will allow our Ukraine to end. That's why when it comes to ending the war, we always add - on our terms. That's why next to the word "peace," the word "just" always sounds. That's why in future history, next to the word Ukraine, the word "independent" will always stand. We fight for this. And we will prevail. On the best day of our lives," he said.

In his address, Zelenskyy thanked the country's soldiers and "everyone in the world who stands by us and with truth.

" Zelenskyy met with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen who had arrived today at the site of the 2022 battle for Hostomel Airport in Kyiv Oblast, a province in north-central Ukraine, surrounding the capital city of Kyiv. "Two years ago, we greeted the enemy landing here with fire. Two years later, we greet our friends, our partners here," Zelenskyy said in his address.

Russian forces failed to capture the airport in 2022 and the plan to "take Kyiv in three days" ultimately failed.

"Today, unfortunately, each of us has someone to keep a moment of silence and honour the memory of. Together we bow our heads. 730 days of pain. But at the same time, 730 days of hope," Zelenskyy said in the video.

"Remembering what Ukrainians have already done - you know that we can definitely do it. It's within our power. We will succeed," he said.

The Ukranian president went on to remind his countrymen of what had been achieved over the past two years.

"And here, in this place, you understand best - metal may not withstand, but Ukrainians do. You can burn the plane, but you cannot destroy the dream. The dream with which each of us falls asleep and wakes up for 730 days, with which you, all our citizens, all Ukrainians fall asleep," Zelenskyy said.

Lauding the people of his country, the Ukranian president said, "A nation that endured in the first three days. And didn't fall on the fourth. And fought for the fifth day. And then a month. And then six months. And now two years. Battles for freedom. Battles for life. Heroically fought by incredible people, to whom I always address in my speeches: Great people, of a great country."

Meanwhile, on February 23, in a meeting of the United Nations Security Council held at its New York headquarters, to discuss the two-year mark of the Russian Ukraine war, the Ukranian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba said, "Two years since its invasion, Moscow's name is synonymous with aggression, war and barbarism. Ukraine wants peace more than any other nation."

However, he said, "We will not allow Russia to kill us freely on the road to peace, nor will we ever accept any offer to surrender or to concede our lands and freedoms under the guise of peace."

In his address to the Security Council, the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres stated that the Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine directly violated both the e UN Charter and international law.

He stated that two years on, the war in Ukraine remains "an open wound at the heart of Europe." "It is high time for peace - a just peace, based on the United Nations Charter, international law and General Assembly resolutions," Guterres said.

On February 24, 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine in an escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War that started in 2014. The invasion has become the largest attack on a European country since World War II.