Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, addressing the Italian parliament, said that Russia had been preparing a war with Ukraine for a long time.
"People of Italy! It is time to do everything possible to ensure peace. This is a war that Russia has been preparing for a long time, that one man has been preparing for a long time. Alone. For dozens of years. Making insane amounts of money from oil and gas exports, channeling it into preparing for war - and not just against Ukraine. Their target is Europe. A decisive influence on your life, control over your politics, destruction of your values, not just ours. Democracy, human rights, equality, freedom. The same values that we have," Zelensky said.
"'When I addressed a rally in Florence and dozens of other European cities just over a week ago, I asked all Italians, all Europeans, to remember the number 79. That's how many children were murdered in Ukraine at that time. Now it's 117. Thirty-eight more children these days. That's the price of procrastination. Delay in pressuring Russia to stop the brutal war," the President of Ukraine also stressed.
