literally the last week was marked by frenzied shelling from the russian federation, one of them is recognized as the largest combined shelling with the use of aeroballistic weapons, almost there in some unconscious period of military history, besides, today we are with you in this program and at this very time in pokrovsk the rubble of the building is being dismantled, in which 11 people are known to have died, including five children. russia continues to terrorize the civilian population. about all this, and not only, of course, with taras zhovtenko, an international expert security of the democratic initiatives fund, a candidate of political sciences and a member of the public council at the ministry of foreign affairs of ukraine. we welcome you. glory to ukraine. i congratulate you, glory to the heroes. congratulations, mr. taras. so, let's start with what the real security situation looks like in the country. moreover, today there was quite an important message, in my opinion, from the publisher.

that the number of missiles that we receive from the united states for the patriot batteries may be significantly reduced, i just do not understand, whether because of not having missiles, because they are so dear, this also needs to be clarified, but in any case, to what extent it will create real problems for the ukrainian air defense, if we take into account that the patriot is not standing everywhere, and ballistic missiles are flying everywhere, but actually in the medium term in the future, it will not create any tangible problems for us, for that reason. that part of the supply is still continuing from the united states of america, plus the white house still has about 4 billion dollars in special funds, there needs a separate authorization from congress for these to get the money, this is not the issue of those 60 billion for ukraine for the 24th year, which was discussed at the end of last year, and it is obvious that this discussion will also be continued in the near future, because the situation there is now developing in such a way that the issue of military financing. aid to both ukraine and israel,

in addition to the fact that this is a matter of strategic, strategic american foreign policy, they are also tied by the administration of president biden to the question of the annual budget of the united states in general, and since now the united states lives on a temporary budget, the term of which expires on january 19, so by january 19, well, at least several rounds of negotiations should pass on such a serious normal. annual budget, because this is the second interim budget since december of '23 that the united states continues to live by in order to avoid a shutdown, so in the coming weeks, i think that the american lawmakers and the white house will definitely come back to the question , well, such serious strategic financing of ukraine, these questions, they will be forced to solve, since this is a question of the annual budget, and regarding the patriot systems, there is another interesting fact here, back in november.

in november, at the beginning of december 23, washington agreed with tokyo and japanese allies that japan would sell to the united states of america a fairly decent batch of interceptor missiles and patriot systems, and these missiles would be intended for ukraine. that is , it is obvious that the white house predicted that there would be russian terrorists this winter try to attack the ukrainian civil and energy infrastructure as much as possible. and the ukrainian defenders need to have a certain margin of safety, first of all, what concerns the interceptor missiles for these anti-aircraft missile systems, and accordingly an agreement was reached with japan that these missiles will be supplied first to the united states of america, and then to ukraine , well, because there are certain internal mechanisms that do not yet allow the japanese government to directly sell weapons to ukraine, which is in a state of war, but these agreements are reached. and it is obvious that

there are already mechanisms for how they will be implemented. ugh. mr. taras, during the entire year 2023, when ukraine was preparing its offensive, in particular in the south, and we appealed to our partners to provide us with the necessary for this, in particular, weapons, do you remember this long catavasia with the provision of tanks and so on, and so on. our partners have constantly emphasized that the help we will give you will be concentrated around your capabilities of... capabilities to protect the sky, shoot down russian missiles attacking your infrastructure and so on and so forth. at that time, many had the impression that our partners, let's say, want to provide us with air defense systems, instead of providing us with offensive weapons . now, once again, new york times analysts emphasize basically the same thing. these attacks, which have occurred in recent... weeks, have even more

acutely emphasized ukraine's urgent need for air defense, which means that we are still betting on offensive weapons some punctuation mark, i hope, not a full stop... well, we see that our american partners are still putting three full stops, taking into account the fact that they have a discussion about providing ukraine with offensive weapons, well, it will now be maximally electrified by these presidential pre-election campaign, which is about to begin, and it is clear that against this background, well, for the biden administration, especially considering that the issue of strategic financing of ukraine in 2024 is suspended for the time being, to say the least some very specific things about the fact that the white house takes another step forward and , in addition to defensive weapons, makes a strategic decision that the supply of offensive weapons to ukraine should be increased, well, these are also additional domestic political risks, which i think the administration of president biden will not go yet, but in this contrast there are very interesting statements from

our european partners, as well as from the european allies of the united states, well , i will start with the statement of the ministry of foreign affairs of france, which caused a fire there very strong in swamps. and the french foreign ministry commented on the situation in belgrade, the situation in belgrade, and the current one as follows, that it is the absolute right of ukraine to strike on the territory of russia in self-defense and to neutralize the russian military potential on the territory of the russian federation, which russia uses to continue to conduct aggressive war on the territory of ukraine, that is , we see that such statements were also appropriate, almost similar to the content of the statement of mr. borel, the top diplomat of the european union. union and of our other allies in europe on the eastern european flank of nato, yes, our northern european allies also voiced almost the same opinions. we see that against this background, our european allies can actually be a little bit ahead of the united states of america, after all

, they have been doing this since '22, because if you look, for example, at the weapons that great britain has provided us with, then we will see that britain was the first to provide very serious samples of weapons. who were such game-changers, and on the battlefield, those who they change the rules. the british were the first to give us the tanks, the british were the first to give us the storm shadow cruise missiles, and finally the french then gave us the scalps, yes, and the americans with the attack are still, so to speak, unable to decide yes or no. so i think the european allies will now use this bottleneck in the middle of the united states of america to, well, let's say, have additional leadership positions. in support of ukraine, and in the end to realize this vision, which in fact is shared by many european countries about that european security should primarily depend on european states and that this is such a difficult dependence of europe on states in terms of ensuring security,

something must be done about it and europe in this context must be more autonomous, well, this is a chance for our european allies will demonstrate this not only by statements, but also in practice, well, in the end we will see, i think that our... european allies have every chance to prove their greater autonomy in terms of ensuring their own security and in terms of supporting ukraine in countering russian threat without such a more proactive position of the states, which everyone is used to. well, on the other hand, i don't know how sensational mr. taras's reaction to the strikes on belgorod can be, because they kept saying: well, you can hit the territory of russia, just not with our missiles, just not with our weapons. the question arises, what about this position? ever change, do you expect such a position to change at all? and this position may gradually change, but we see that our european allies, they are making it so that it is not the position that changes, but the situation, because well, we even see it not only in our european allies, but also in

washington, so those statements that sound that ukraine should establish its own weapons production, and it is obvious that this will be a weapons production that will be based on... western technologies, on western licenses, well , in the end it will be the same western weapons, only produced in ukraine, and it is obvious that these weapons, which will already be produced in ukraine, and will not be delivered from factories there in in germany, in the united states of america, or in france or in britain, here are these restrictions, they will no longer be distributed, that is, the west will simply maintain this position and will have the opportunity to continue speaking from these positions and say: well, you see, weapons of western production, they do not hit the territory russia, and the fact that ukraine has... learned to produce the same weapons for itself, well , these are already ukrainian weapons, we cannot regulate these issues here, because ukraine is a sovereign state, it is fighting for its own independence and own survival, and therefore the weapons they produce are hers can use absolutely as they see fit, and the fact that our

western partners are aiming precisely at developing the ukrainian military industry in the first place, it is clear that this is not some short-term perspective, but none the less, well, what if more we will build up our own. the ability to even simply collect some western samples of weapons on the territory of ukraine, here the germans are already helping us with zavodal, which is announced to be launched in the near future, it is clear that... there will be a minimum of open information there, but that is not less, here are these weapons, they will already be ukrainian weapons, and it is obvious that, for example, the same marders or leopards are potentially assembled on the territory of ukraine, at our factory capacities, yes, capacities, they can absolutely cross the border of the russian federation, our western partners it will only be welcomed, and while we are talking about our ability to shoot down russian missiles, we cannot also ignore the latest features on... arrows, some of the missiles used by russia were manufactured literally in the last quarter of 2023,

the russians also used the weapons kindly given to them by the harbinger of evil, as they say, north korea, which supposedly now also has something to do, they are shelling the sea there and the border areas with south korea. in a word, what are the prospects of what we will see more often, shooting down and, unfortunately, arriving also on the territory of our country. precisely weapons of such origin, not russian, well, the practice of how moscow agreed with tigran, unfortunately, shows that, by all means , agree with pyongyang to north korea supplied its weapons samples to the russian terrorist army , unfortunately, this is the reality we have to deal with, that is, we understand that on the one hand, the russian military-political leadership does this, as they say, not because of an easy life , yes, that is, well... it is clear that their military-industrial complex cannot cope with the level of expenditure and ammunition and missiles, and losses of equipment on

the battlefield, yes, but nevertheless, and they are also forced to run with an outstretched hand, and to north korea, and to iran, but nevertheless, the fact that these countries agree to help russia, and the fact that russia will receive samples of weapons and , well, an appropriate amount, of course, not such that could completely satisfy the russian generals, yes, because otherwise, well, they about... they just asked someone for this everything, but nevertheless, it will significantly help the russian command to stay afloat and continue to fight the way they are used to fighting, primarily based on quantity and not on quality, so if we are talking about north korea itself, then after all, in addition to ballistic missiles, comrade ying supplied the russian federation with artillery shells and shells for rocket launcher systems, although they said that the quality of these shells was so-so. even there there was a certain small batch of these shells that fell into the hands of the armed forces of ukraine, and we

, too, from our side could look at these products, north korean technological miracles, and make sure that, in fact , there is no quality there, and somewhere around a third of these shells, well, they simply either burst in the barrels or fly not where it is needed, but with the fact that north korea in general delivered first a million, and then another 500,000 of these shells, even if you reject a third of these 500,00... this will still mean a million additional shells that the russian artillery received, and this is the same million projectiles that we did not receive from the european union, which we were also promised under a separate program until march 24th, so it is a pity that the russians still manage to agree on these additional supplies of weapons from iran from north korea, it is in in principle, the russian command will be allowed, well, somewhere at such an average minimum level, but to continue to conduct this... military campaign, based on quantitative indicators, not only in meat, and in personnel and in these meat assaults, but

on unfortunately, in those strike systems that the russians use both against our military and, unfortunately, against our civilian targets as well. thank you, mr. tarasa, taras zhovtenko, international security expert of the democratic initiative foundation, political candidate nauk, a member of the public council under the ministry of foreign affairs of ukraine, was on the phone, we are going to break for a few minutes, but please don't interrupt. turn on the good, it’s when everything is as you want, click and you are in the world of cartoons, click and the world of cinema is around, then on the good, oh, what you need, megogo, turn on hundreds of channels, thousands of movies and sports, oh, i went for a walk, water, there is not enough ordinary water here, drink reo, i am saving myself, reo. you are ready, dear, ready, took reo. reo - water for special medical purposes. daily,

every hour, every minute we receive a large amount of information. the most anticipated event of the year, which is actually happening on the front. what are the losses of personnel and equipment. on the battlefield, how does the international community evaluate our successes and what is moscow lying about? from the flow of news coming from everywhere, we single out the most important ones. the world is busy. monitors whether there will be weapons for ukraine and what kind, and what are the russian occupiers whispering about behind the backs of the commanders? news, summaries of the week - this is a review of only important events, events of weighty, reliable, it's analytics, fact-checking, expert commentary, about it and much more in today's edition: about what matters in plain language, accessible to all viewers. greetings, iryna koval is in the studio, and these are

the results of the week on the espresso tv channel. news, summaries of the week, every saturday. at 21:00 for espresso. we continue the saturday political club program, khrystyna yatskiv and vitaly portnikov. we will immediately add our next guest for the conversation, igor eisenberg, a professor at new york university. already in touch with us. mr. igor, congratulations, glory to ukraine. glory to the heroes, i congratulate you, friends, i congratulate all the viewers. you know, recently, mr. igor, the discussion about the possibility of transferring russian assets to ukraine, which are currently frozen in the west, has intensified. and so the question arises, how realistic is this conversation in general, or is it simply an element of pressure on moscow? well, based on the fact that there are reports that this is already being discussed at the level of consultations

between the g7 countries and the european union, i think it is serious. and by the way. in the united states one, at least one very a well-known lawyer, professor of constitutional law, and professor at harvard university , laurence tribe, he argued, he wrote several articles about this, and on television he argued that this is possible because sovereign russian assets, they are not private property that is protected, let's say in the united states by the constitution, and the state cannot... confiscate without a court order, and since these are sovereign assets, it is based on the fact that if russia is an aggressor state that has committed armed aggression, committed war crimes and does not want to compensate the victim of aggression for all losses, and even then it is quite possible to confiscate these assets for

the benefit of ukraine in this case, well, this is his point of view. you and i are not lawyers, but i think this is serious, and this, and this is actually being discussed, in general, if we are talking about the decision of the united states to give aid to ukraine, israel, and taiwan, the actual bargaining continues for concessions in order to move the dead points, this is exactly the solution, but at what stage are these auctions now, the auctions are, i was trying to find some. the news on this, the latest news, it dates back to december, although it said that the senators, even during the holidays, during the vacation that they went on, they continue to consult, there is a group of six senators, three democrats and three republicans, which are negotiating a compromise, which is not about aid to ukraine, as you know,

which is about changes in american immigration law. and the senate returns to work on monday, that is , then they will officially continue their conversations, and you can expect some statements for journalists, as the senators will return to washington, just journalists, they will naturally ask how these things are going, let's hope that there will be some news next week, early next week, but for now we have ... the following signals, in particular , i refer now to the spokesman of the us state department, matthew miller, who has stirred up our society a little with his last speech. we will continue to support ukraine as long as it is needed. this is the policy of the united states. this does not mean that we will maintain the same level of military funding as in 2022 and 2023. we do not believe that

there is a need for this. the united states, according to him , is betting on... the permanence or , well, the subjectivity of our military-industrial complex in the near future, perhaps. dmytro kuleba , minister of foreign affairs of ukraine, reassures , and says that there is no need to fuss, we are not talking about the 24th year, but about the overall concept of the united states. in the beginning , a lot of people helped, but then we watch how in this sense, ukraine is taking the initiative into its own hands, do you have certain fears here? i don't have it, i think that dmytro koleb is right, the fact is that as i saw this quote from mittya miller in ukraine, someone twisted it, someone did not... completely give it, the fact is that he really, he meant the future, not defined, because he said that the goal of the united states is for ukraine to be

a free, democratic country, to stand firmly on its own two feet, so it is in the interest of the united states to ensure the opportunity for ukraine to produce ammunition and weapons in ukraine, but he further emphasized that... you quoted his texts, but that's about half of what he said, he goes on to say that we're not there yet, and that's why we have to continue to help to ukraine, at least at the same level as it was in 22-23 years, that is, this is a long-term strategic goal, but it is not at all about the fact that the administration is in favor of reducing aid to ukraine now, the fact is that on the contrary, in these 60-60... dollars, which the administration is asking congress to allocate for aid to ukraine, there for military aid, the money has been increased, the request has been increased almost

one and a half times, and for the allocation of weapons under the pda program, under which weapons are simply transferred from the pentagon, and for the order of weapons through the aid program for ukraine in the security industry, these are you'. the white house is asking for an increase for the 24th year, that is, they plan to provide more weapons to ukraine in the 24th year than even in the 23rd year, the expenses are slightly reduced, i think, well, that's it to the request of the white house for other types of aid, there for direct financial aid, humanitarian aid, but it is for military aid that the white house is asking to increase spending for the 24th year. let's talk about... mr. igor about what is happening in american politics, because this week it just became known that the president of the united states,

donald trump, the former president of the united states, donald trump, he can win the support of the supreme court of the united states, to rule out the possibility of pre-election to premiums in those american states where the authorities have already made such a decision. so far this is the state of colorado, it is still the state of maine, how much in principle can the supreme court of the united states support trump, or can it be that the decision of the supreme court will become sensational and indeed for the first time in history a candidate for the position of president of the united states will not be allowed to participate in the pre-election campaign campaign? look, i'd be happy if it were, but as you just said, i'm not a lawyer, but i think the supreme court in this case... holding trump, unfortunately, well, the fact is that whatever the ideological views, the ideological beliefs of the supreme

court justices, they are still judges, and they follow the law. the point is that not allowing trump to run for office, under the third section of the 14th amendment to the united states constitution, because trump has not been found guilty by any court of law that he... he participated in rebellion against the united states, then it is subject to interpretation by specific officials, such as the maine secretary of state state, which is responsible for conducting elections, or a particular court, the supreme court of the state of colorado, which, in response to a lawsuit by several public organizations, suspended trump from participating in the prairies, the supreme court can interpret it. to put it another way, i think that since there is no court verdict against trump, a guilty verdict against trump, about his participation in the rebellion against the united states,

then the supreme court will most likely say that since there is no verdict, it cannot be said that he took part in the rebellion against the us, so he can take part in the elections, although i would be happy if he did not take part in the elections, but please tell me. in general, in the united states, such decisions can be based, in particular, on the personalities of the judges of the supreme court, because, well, i will just remind you that a certain part of them was appointed during the term of office of donald trump, we in ukraine are used to assuming that you know who the judge was appointed for, that he will fence off in every way where he can afford it. i hope that this tradition is slowly changing, but... can something like this even exist in the states, or is there still an institution above all else, and despite the fact that the judges are absolutely specific people,

they will be guided exclusively by the norms of the law. i think the latter is true, although three of the nine supreme court justices are appointed by trump, but if even the supreme court supports trump in this case, it is not because these judges are appointed by trump. after all, they are judges, and if there is a law that clearly says something, they cannot go against the law, even if they don't like this law. and there have been times when this supreme court has ruled against trump, and more than once. the supreme court, let's say, ruled against trump during trump's appeal of the election results of '20. he ruled against trump when trump wouldn't release, say, his tax returns, and several other times. that is, when there is a law, then judges, whatever their ideological beliefs may be, whoever appoints them, they are still judges, and they are simply guided

by the law, when it is clear. there is no law in some cases, they can be guided by their beliefs, their feelings, how to interpret certain things, but when there is a clear law, then i think that at least the vast majority of judges of the supreme court will be guided by the current, effective law. well, there is also the question of public trust, you remember that once the supreme court of the united states decided the hill. a fundamental decision for the future of the country in the case of gore v. bush, when the vice president of the united states, albert gore , tried to deny the victory of george w. bush the youngest in the election of the head of the american state, the court decided in favor of bush , not grief, but many people in the american media said that such a decision was made because there is a conservative majority in the court, and the majority of judges are appointed by presidents, republicans, about

then they shot films about theft. victory, it became such a meme, and if the court were to rule in favor of trump now, wouldn't it be that most of the american media would say that the judges did it, precisely because the majority of the supreme court justices the courts of the united states are appointed by republican presidents, the judges are appointed by democrat presidents in the minority, i think the media can say that, it is quite possible, as i agree with the decision in favor of bush in 2000, it was more then.. . than based on laws, although bush won in florida quite honestly, there was a recount afterwards, he got about 500 more votes, but there was no clear definition, because it was the first time in history, it was not regulated in any way, therefore, this was precisely the case when judges could rely on their convictions, whether conscious

or subconscious. and i think that if there is a decision in favor of trump in this case , of course there will be media who will not like it, they will say that it is precisely because there are three judges appointed by trump, and most of the judges are appointed republican presidents, well, again, i think that the vast majority of judges will use the law, but if there is a clear definition in the law, they will use that clear by definition, even if they don't... like this law, well, it comes down to the fact that, if we are talking about candidates from each of the parties, everything is clear with the democrats, actually joseph biden, the current president of the united states, but with the republicans, everything it is still not completely clear, in particular for the reasons we just talked about, what are the main trends now, but at this stage, we understand that they may change in the coming months, already literally at the beginning of spring, super tuesday,

i think, this it will be very interesting to observe, and what are the main trends now, what is the possible public sentiment now regarding the republican candidates? trump has high support, but is it unanimous enough to talk about the unchallengeable nature of his nomination? it is not uniform, but the support is so great that i think it is possible to talk about... without appeal, because on january 15 the first primaries, not primaries, caucuses are not held in the state of aogo. people come to meetings, vote for candidates from his party, and trump will definitely win them, after that he will start winning in one state after another, he will win everywhere, maybe he won't win somewhere...