“History, the future and security simply leave us no choice but to emerge from this crisis. We did not cause this crisis and are determined to end it,” Kuleba said in an interview published today by the InterfaxUkraine agency.
According to the head of Kyiv diplomacy, “emotions are high” due to Poland’s parliamentary elections on October 15, in which the ruling party is betting on its future in power, and “the temperature could still rise.”
“We are working with the European Commission. We have sent clear signals to Poland that we are committed to finding a constructive solution to this situation. We don’t need this grain war and neither does Poland,” he explained.
Relations between Kiev and Warsaw, one of Ukraine’s main allies, are in a tense phase after the Polish government decided to expand restrictions on imports of Ukrainian agricultural products, arguing to protect the interests of Polish farmers.
Last week, Ukraine filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization against Poland, Hungary and Slovakia, countries with the same decision.
In an intervention before the UN General Assembly in New York, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky criticized countries that showed solidarity but in reality favored the Kremlin with their actions statements that caused outrage in Warsaw.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki later announced that the country would stop deliveries of new weapons to Ukraine, limit themselves to previously agreed deliveries and focus on modernizing its own armed forces.
After these episodes, the Ukrainian Foreign Minister emphasized, using the example of relations with Bulgaria and Romania, that Kiev had shown that there were “no insoluble problems”.
“I would like to remind you that at the beginning of the crisis, in the spring of this year, five countries introduced restrictions. Now Bulgaria and Romania have found a solution, but the other three countries have not. The reason why they were not found is “Of course, this is not because there are no solutions. There are other reasons why these solutions have not been found,” he commented, adding that everything depends on the political will and that Kiev has this desire.
But he acknowledged that false narratives about Ukraine’s ingratitude toward Poland could pose a longterm security risk by stoking public distrust.
Kuleba emphasized that Ukraine is deeply grateful for Poland’s solidarity and support since the beginning of the Russian invasion in February 2022.
In the same interview, he called for more Western weapons, such as North America’s ATACMS missiles, to destroy Russian production capabilities, and tougher sanctions against Moscow, including its nuclear sector, and even the concession of frozen Russian state assets to Ukraine.
Dmytro Kuleba expressed confidence that the United States will eventually deliver longrange ATACMS missiles, calling it a “matter of time,” as with previous advanced weapons systems such as HIMARS, which Washington was initially hesitant to deliver.
In his opinion, the supply of Western weapons is urgently needed to prevent Russia from further producing new missiles and drones that reach Ukrainian cities. He further stressed that it was cheaper for the West to help destroy Russian weapons factories than to continually help rebuild Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure.
The head of Ukrainian diplomacy said that he and US officials did not criticize, but on the contrary acknowledged, the pace of Ukraine’s recent counteroffensive to retake the territories occupied by the Russians during President Zelensky’s highlevel visit to the United States last week that “Given the limitations of overcoming the enemy’s strong defenses, a miracle occurred.
“The American military judges the effectiveness of the counteroffensive not by comments on social media and in newspapers, but by the reality on the battlefield. They understand that what the Ukrainian Defense Forces have achieved both in the south and in the east is real military.” “A miracle given all the circumstances, such as the minefields and Russian air dominance,” he commented.