the united states of america, unfortunately, given the ongoing political upheavals in washington, it was unlikely that this help would arrive in the near future. president joseph biden reminds me in some ways of the president of the united states, woodrow wilson, who had extremely good and powerful wishes, who tried to create a new system of relations in the world, but the american political establishment did not support him, so well... nations without the united states were de facto doomed, but now i have a feeling that president joseph biden may repeat, na too bad for us the career of president woodrow wilson. on the other hand, the deputy secretary of state of the united states, victoria nuland, recently visited us , she knows ukraine, she knows how to work with american institutions, and her visit coincided. hearing about the possible resignation

of the commander-in-chief of the armed forces of ukraine, general valery zaluzhny. victoria nuland has been a friend of mine for over 30 years, and i have had the privilege of working with her both in the white house and at the state department. i remember her well presence on the maidan in the 14th year, where she actively supported the movement by handing out cookies and showing solidarity. however, it is important to note that it has no effect on the decision. which will be approved by president zelenskyi. as far as i know her character, victoria nuland would never try to convince president zelensky to keep general zaluzhny in office or to fire him. in general, zaluzhnyi is well regarded in washington, especially for his effectiveness as a commander during the successful counteroffensive in september 22. this counteroffensive led to the liberation of kherson and the expulsion of russian troops. from near kharkov. the apparent disagreements

between president zelensky and general zaluzhny seem to relate to zaluzhny's frank assessment of the situation on the ground, in particular , the stalemate on the demarcation line between ukrainian and russian troops in southern ukraine. zaluzhnyi emphasized the need for potentially unpopular measures to strengthen advanced forces and overcome resource shortages, with which president zelenskyi it doesn't seem like it. while i cannot speak to the specifics of victoria's remarks during her stay in kyiv , it is becoming increasingly clear from the front-line news reports that the view being taken about the need for more soldiers, ammunition and weapons is likely to be correct. after all, the dispute between zaluzhnyi and president zelenskyi is an internal matter for ukraine, as the national leader and commander-in-chief. president zelenskyy has

the authority to make decisions on specific personnel issues. he has it to exercise judgment in the best interests of the ukrainian people. so, opinions about zaluzhny and the united states' perception of another war scenario. in washington, there are different views on the current situation. first of all, the official position of the us government is that interference in the decision of president zelensky regarding the command of general zaluzhnyi. is not within their competence. it is believed to be the prerogative and responsibility of the ukrainian president to determine whom he trusts, especially when it comes to the situation on the battlefield. second, general zaluzhnyi enjoys high authority in washington, like all ukrainian military personnel, after all. over the past few years, especially since russia's first invasion of ukraine in 2014, experts in washington who monitor the course of military events in ukraine have been amazed by the evolution. and achievements of the ukrainian

military, general zaluzhny is credited with an important role in this transformation, and thirdly, many in washington perceive president zelensky as a hero, who is considered one of the most significant and effective national leaders in the world. he commands deep respect and admiration in washington circles, so regardless of president zelensky's decision regarding his commander-in-chief, washington will likely continue to support him. however, i personally think that general zaluzhny is probably right when he says that ukraine needs more soldiers on the battlefield, whether it is 500 thousand as suggested by zaluzhny or some other number. ukraine urgently needs replenishment of human resources at the front, as well as a significant increase in artillery ammunition. with at one time, we remember, about one and a half years ago, the so-called istanbul meetings took place, certain negotiations took place, now. putin goes to erdogan personally, not

shoigu, not abramovich and so on. we understand that they will discuss a lot of issues, there are really a lot of them. the burning middle east. prospects of a third world war on the shores of the red sea, but putin will also insist on his agenda, in particular, when we are talking about the russian-ukrainian war. i'm not entirely sure about the purpose of the president's visit putin to turkey and his meeting with president erdoğan, however, one issue that i think will definitely come up is their negotiations regarding a turkish hub for russian natural gas. turkey and russia, represented by erdogan and putin, respectively, are engaged in long-term negotiations regarding a new agreement to increase the supply of russian natural gas to turkey. moreover , turkey wants to get discounts on a significant part of the gas and intends to transport the rest of the gas to europe through bulgaria, serbia and

hungary. despite numerous rounds negotiations, the two sides still have not concluded this agreement. i know that president putin is interested in her. so it will probably be on the agenda. in addition, president putin may want to sway turkey to russia's position on ukraine. however, as we discussed earlier, president erdogan has followed a consistent and balanced policy towards russia aimed at countering russian expansion in the black sea region. avoiding unnecessary tension. turkey consistently supports territorial integrity of ukraine, condemns the annexation. crimea and calls for an end to russia's military operations. however, despite providing ukraine with military support from drones to naval potential, turkey refrains from joining the sanctions against russia and encourages turkish companies to continue doing business with russia. such a balanced approach

serves turkey's national interests, and it is unlikely that president putin will be able to convince turkey to abandon it in favor of supporting russia against ukraine, because ... such a move would be against the main interests republic of turkey. well, in any case , we understand what happened with the various plans of the meeting, formally the national security advisers, the meetings took place in the middle east. rriyad and on, on, on. we understand that a certain process is ongoing. there were signals from switzerland, that is, the minister of foreign affairs of switzerland also gave signals that it was necessary to speak, feel, yes. so to speak, some formula of peace. i believe that now is not the best time for negotiations, unless ukraine is ready for them. if president zelenskyi does not will come to the conclusion that there is no real way to oust russia from crimea and donbas and will not

make a choice in favor of negotiations, then it is premature to talk about any negotiations. currently, ukraine is aiming at the reconquest of its territories, at the restoration of territorial integrity. and asserting its sovereignty, so supporting a peaceful settlement at this stage plays into putin's hands, potentially allowing russia to consolidate its territorial gains in ukraine, similar to the situation in which georgia found itself in 2008, when russia left its occupation troops, and georgia was forced to withdraw its troops from its own territory. regarding putin's potential agenda. it is worth noting that turkey already acted as a mediator between ukraine and russia in march 22, contributing to the negotiations on ending the war. ukraine then proposed a cease-fire agreement, according to which russia would have to withdraw all its troops that entered ukraine after february 24, 2022.

ukraine would declare neutrality, refrain from joining nato, and discuss legal issues the status of donbas after 15 years. although this proposal is no longer under discussion, it showed ukraine's willingness to consider diplomatic solutions. however, russia rejected this offer, as putin preferred the continuation of the conflict. therefore, given ukraine's determination to defend and return its territory, external parties, including switzerland, should refrain from pressuring ukraine to cease hostilities if ukraine is not ready. before that, well, unfortunately, i have to end our conversation, thank you, mr. ambassador, for this brilliant analysis, i want to remind our tv viewers that matthew bryza, ex-adviser of the united states secretary of state, former director of european and eurasian affairs at the

us national security council, was working for them on espresso. the time of our program has run out, stay tuned to the espresso tv channel. my colleagues will inform you about all the most important events of the day. take care of yourself and your loved ones. see you on air. greetings, my name is tatyana vysotska and we are in the palace of europe, the headquarters of the council of europe in strasbourg and we have the opportunity to talk with the secretary general of the council of europe maria pejchynovych burych. with ms. maria , we will talk about ukraine's path to the eu, how the council of europe can help ukraine on this path, as well as how to bring the bloody aggressor putin to justice and how to build a compensation mechanism. for damages caused to ukraine by the war. dear

madam secretary general, thank you for this conversation with us. you have been the head of the council of europe for almost 5 years, and during all this time the council of europe and you personally have always done a lot to support and help ukraine. reflecting on these years, what do you consider to be the main achievements? in fact, i started working in this position even before the start of this terrible full-scale aggression of the russian federation against ukraine. from the very beginning , cooperation with ukraine has been very active and important, but our kyiv office has become the largest office in the member states. this is evidence of how important ukraine was and remains for us. speaking about achievements, i would start with... directions in which we worked and can already be seen tangible results. one such

area is certainly improving the protection of human rights for internally displaced persons and those returning home. another direction is the new law on media, and in general the sphere of media and the system of public broadcasting in ukraine. there is also another direction, and i am very proud that ukraine has made huge progress here in recent years. 5 years is the fight against domestic violence, violence against women and children, including the ratification of the istanbul convention, our gold standard in this an area that ukraine very boldly ratified, even despite the war that was already ongoing in 2022, when the convention was ratified. i think this is a huge and important improvement of the measures currently being taken in ukraine to help ukrainian women. and children, and not only those who are in ukraine, but also those who, for known unfortunate reasons, are

outside its borders. we also jointly improved the legislation in the field of social human rights, protection and promotion of the rights of minorities and the lgbt community. and these are just a few examples of where we are we see very, very tangible results, which we are very proud of. another aspect that is very important for every citizen. of ukraine is that we have worked hard and achieved a better policy and a better legislative framework for the reform of local self-government. actually, these achievements are significant steps on the path of european integration of ukraine. last year, the european council and the european commission agreed to start negotiations on ukraine's accession to the eu. how can the council of europe help us now? to harmonize our legislation with european, in particular through the adopted

action plan regarding ukraine. first of all, let me congratulate ukraine on obtaining this candidate status and the start of negotiations, because this is a great achievement and, in my opinion, a significant paradigm shift of the european institutions regarding enlargement, when a country that suffers from an aggressive... against it gets such an opportunity . this is a huge signal for ukraine and ukrainians that we see that this war must end and that ukraine has a very clear european perspective. at the same time ukraine has been a member of the council of europe for a long time, and we are very happy that thanks to our new action plan, the implementation of which began last year in 2023 and will continue for four years until 2026 . we can help ukraine in this direction. the plan is called resilience, recovery and reconstruction, which means that we

want to focus on the immediate needs of ukraine and ukrainians, as well as on the medium term to help ukraine, both during the war and in the post-war period. in this regard, we have the largest budget within one action plan among the member states of the council of europe, approximately 50 million euros. and we allocated for its implementation, and i am very happy about the support of the action plan for ukraine from other member states who make voluntary contributions, and which is very large, how about you? noted, our action plan aims to help ukraine in those areas, in particular in the protection of human rights, democracy and the rule of law, which will be screened, as it is called in the jargon of the european union, and which will be important for negotiations on ukraine's accession to the eu . in fact, many so-called political criteria for membership in the european

union also belong to the key criteria of the council of europe. so... we can say very clearly that a number of areas that we are working on as part of the action plan will directly contribute to the accession negotiations, starting with major reforms such as judicial and constitutional reforms, continuing with work in the field of media as well as local development self-government, reforming municipalities, and so on. after the start of russia's full-scale invasion of ukraine in 2020. by an organization that almost immediately excluded russia from its membership, but now the question of responsibility is becoming increasingly acute: how to punish the leaders of russia and belarus for starting a war against ukraine and crimes against humanity. what can the council of europe do, what is it already doing?

became key from the morning of february 24, 2022, when this terrible morning began with the illegal aggression of the russian federation against ukraine. it was very obvious that the council of europe must send a signal, either russia ceases aggression and withdraws troops, or it is expelled from organizations of course, they didn't listen to anyone and were kicked out in record time. this is the first time in the history of the council of europe that such a decision has been taken... and i am very proud that our organization has shown unity on this issue, this is one area where we have shown what responsibility is, the other area is to start helping immediately the prosecutor general of ukraine was collecting evidence that could be used in court or other proceedings in the future, as there was a serious threat

of losing some of it. in the meantime, we created the register of losses, which was and... remains to this day the first international prosecution mechanism, that is , we backed up our words with actions, the register is designed to collect evidence of losses, injuries or damages that were caused to individual individuals or the state of ukraine by terrible actions russian federation. of course, the damage register should be part of the overall compensation mechanism, this is only the first part, there are two others that... need to be implemented, we are working on it with the international community. the question that was on table from the very beginning is, of course, a crime of aggression. the council of europe was a participant in the initiative when the first reflections began on how we can best contribute to the creation of a special tribunal on the crime of aggression. and i think

that the fact that the international criminal court took certain steps, issuing warrants for the arrest of putin, his shoemaker, and the children's affairs became one of the right directions on the way to prosecution, talking about the register of losses. since may , several more important steps have been taken: the first is creation conference of participants of the body, which includes 44 participants, 43 member states and the european union. it is important that among these 43 states are all members of the big seven. an important body of the registry is the board, which consists of seven members chosen from among the leading lawyers nominated by the conference of participants, with the former president of the european court of human rights, robert spano, elected as president. of course, we have a director nominated by the conference of participants, and

we have also located the registry in the hague, as the city of the hague is the center international justice. the netherlands expressed its desire to have a registry and we did so. we also wanted to open a representative office of the registry in kyiv from the very beginning. and now we are already on the way to that. we hope that the registry will be able to accept the first applications already in april. it is very important that the registry starts working now, but it is equally important to think about the next stages now. the first stage is the registration of claims, but then it is very important to create a suitable one. grievance commission and the corresponding compensation fund, according to the submitted applications. accountability is an absolute prerequisite for achieving a just peace in the future. and the registry is one of the extremely important steps in this direction. and where do you expect to get these funds

for compensation? will it be frozen russian assets or something else? the council of europe leads and will continue to lead the work on the management of the damage register, but with regard to the creation of a general compensation mechanism, decisions must be made. states participating in this process in a broader context. we are very would also like to be a part of this process, as its connection with the registry is key. i think that the participants who will work on the creation of a common compensation mechanism will find funding for it through joint efforts. speaking of the international tribunal for putin and lukashenka, are you discussing with ou. or other international organizations, the question of in what form it can be created. this discussion

is currently taking place at the level of experts within the framework of the main group of states i mentioned. at the moment , the moment has not yet come when the participants of the main event groups will ultimately decide how and when to establish the tribunal. it is always important to involve as many people as possible in such a process. international organizations, including judicial institutions such as the icc and others. i think that a wider discussion about what would be the best solution and how to move towards it, once agreement is reached, will lend legitimacy to the future tribunal when it is formed. therefore , it is good that the discussions are thorough and that all possible ways of creating the tribunal are really being considered, it is necessary so that after taking... a precise decision, it can start to function effectively.

watch this week in the collaborators program with olena kononenko. who headed the rashist organizations in the occupied territories? under the protection of ours. friends, russian soldiers. but to whom did united russia entrust the fake mandates? the words of volodymyr volodymyrovych, they always sound: congratulations, i'm olena kononenko and this is the collaborator program, about traitors who, following the call of their hearts and wallets, went to serve the rashiv occupiers. today there will be many new faces of treason, who are asking to be defamed throughout the country. but let's start with a seller well known to you, a music producer. yuriy bardash. after the full-scale invasion, he fled the country and first hid in georgia. there, on the pages of his social networks, he compared ukraine with nazi germany, and

called himself a russian. after that, bardash allegedly began to receive threats from the georgian legion, so the traitor decided to scratch his way to russia. i came here, roughly speaking, with a backpack. yes, i've been to moscow before, but this time with... the knowledge that i'm here forever. in his telegram channel, a great expert and traitor, bardash writes that it was the armed forces of ukraine that blew up kakhovsk and believes that the descendants of russia will study how a great power, standing on its knees, ruled the history of the whole world. i think that no one will study it, because such an empire must simply disappear. in addition to everything, bardash boasted that he would soon receive a russian passport and also change his name, and he called the glimpses of ukrainian patriotism that appeared in him a few years ago a coincidence. the phrase "putin is ours" is a phrase that

reassured ukrainians. they wanted me to eat said that and so the traitor's dream finally came true. on january 23, he received a cherished passport with a chicken. there is nothing to be happy about, because he will soon lose his ukrainian citizenship. now even the rooster in the ukrainian village has more rights and freedoms than a bardash for... for which the door to the civilized world will finally close. well, then about those who are also trying with all their might to be useful for russia, it is true to serve nofuro, such as, for example, 34-year-old alina shamrai, who from july 2022 heads the russian public organization union of mothers kherson the people of kherson region were finally able to get out of the backyards of ukraine and choose their own future. after watching this. the video raises a lot of doubts about the adequacy of a person and whether he has common sense, although what am i talking about, what common sense do collaborators have until

february 24 about... almost no one had heard of shamrai, but when the kherson region was occupied, the russian scum started massively write laudatory odes about the union of the subjects of kherson and its head. as it turned out, this organization cooperates with local gauleiters and promotes russian propaganda under the guise of the interests of children. as you ask, everything is very simple, through manipulation and lies. on camera, shamray begins to sing a song about the desire of children to sleep peacefully in cribs, and not in the basement. to go to kindergarten and walk in parks under a peaceful sky without shelling, but at the same time forgets one important detail: to say who exactly took away our children's childhood, thanks to whom the little one hears explosions and has to hide in shelters at night. already now we feel safe under the protection of ours friends, russian soldiers. the shamray organization is financed at the expense of the occupation military-civilian administration of the kherson

region. and its participants are paid in rubles, i don't even know how much you need to earn to say such frank vomiting on camera, although alina doesn't seem to need a lot, the main thing is that it's enough for a little girl. as the former head of the shamrai organization, she distributes leaflets kherson region будущество вместе с россия and takes an active part in political events, calls for the opening of educational institutions in order to integrate children into life under a tricolor cloth. as we used to do, we signed up , there was an electronic queue, but now i came for free, the child is satisfied in a group of 15 people, why not, sit at home and wait, or is it better to go, study and teach our children? in may of last year , a notice appeared on the page of the prosecutor general's office about the suspicion of shamrai, she faces up to 12 years in prison with confiscation of property. meanwhile, in ukraine

, the court is waiting for this traitor. the sentence and the cell, she herself grabs for the last opportunities to sink further to the social bottom. alina is also trying to build a political career in the occupied territories. we found her name in the list of candidates from the united russia party in the past fake elections of deputies of the kherson region, but the traitor was never able to get the promised mandate. we see that in the conditions of the svo, the kherson region and other new regions demonstrate an impressive performance. with russia, the journalists of trc tavria every day heroically perform their work, well , someone take the bottle away from her, bring her to her senses and inform that soon drastic changes in life are waiting for her, she will have to enjoy a shefir, not a gray one. from a masseuse to an official's chair, this is kuzmenko evgenia mykolaivna , born in 1989 in the village of novotroitske,

kherson. region, her father mykola kuzmenko is the archpriest of the novokokhov diocese of the uoc mp. kuzmenko graduated from kherson state university and until february 24 was engaged in cosmetology and worked as a massage therapist. when the great war began, she moved to her parents in the village of novotroitske, there she joined the occupiers and began to beg for positions. at first, the invaders placed kuzmenko in a local employment center. she served there with faith and truth, so the rashists decided. to advance it further, tori kusmenko was included in the list of candidates for the occupation regional duma deputies from the united russia party in the pseudo-elections that took place from september 1 to 10. on propaganda channels , yevgenia demonstrated true popular love and support for the russian federation. in local public places , the collaborator urged locals to repaint the ukrainian symbols in the tricolor. there are elections mechanism of control and balance of power. citizens have an opportunity.