Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he believes Prime Minister Narendra Modi can help end the war with Russia. “This is the huge value of him in any conflict. This is a huge value of India,” he said in an exclusive interview with the Times of India.
At the recent BRICS Summit, PM Modi had expressed his desire to work for peace in the context of the Ukraine war. Sharing his thoughts on the Prime Minister’s speech, Zelenskyy said, “Modi is the PM of a really huge country – from the perspective of population, impact, influence and economy. Such a country cannot just say that it is interested in the end of a war. We are all interested in that. All of the leaders will tell you tomorrow that they would like to end the war… this is a very common thing, especially for such a huge country as India.”
Countries like India could easily facilitate the end of the war by blocking the Russian economy, the Ukraine president stressed.
“Real influence on blocking of the Russian economy, blocking of cheap energy resource, blocking of the defence-industrial complex of Russia will lead to the decrease in capacity of Moscow to wage wars against us,” he said. “Twenty great economies can put Putin in his place to end the war. They can do that. Not just incentivizing it but vice versa to slow down all of his desires and you don’t need to say we would like peace. You need to act because daily war is killing people,” he added.
On what India can do specifically for Ukrainian children, he said PM Modi should bring back at least 1,000 children who were forcibly deported. “You can join the coalition of the bring back of children. You can call Putin and ask him who he is. You can force him to bring the children back. Prime Minister Modi can do that. He has really huge influence. He can just say specifically, how many Ukrainian children will be given to me so that I can bring them back to Ukraine. Just say that directly. Give me 1,000 children who will be brought back to Ukraine. This is the real step. Let PM Modi bring back only 1,000 at least,” he said.
If every such influential person as Prime Minister Modi can bring back 1,000, we will be able to bring back the majority of our children, said Zelenskyy, that’s what’s needed to be done.
“You need to raise this issue at the G20 meet,” he added.
