they need a lot of things every day and that is why part of my life today is helping the armed forces of ukraine and i am very grateful to my colleagues for supporting me in this, the war has become a part of each of us, i am trying to find strength in myself not to despair and continue to help our soldiers in the end, the strength to wake up every morning is given by the tireless work of volunteers, favorite work and the closest people around, but the most inspiring to live are our defenders, i thank our defenders for the opportunity to feel alive and support them financially, each of you can help even a small contribution to the support of the army saves the

lives of our soldiers and brings our victory closer . i will watch the program of the ukrainian voice of america service at time. i am nataliya leonova. congratulations, after the russian drone attacks on wednesday , the us ambassador to ukraine bridget bring stressed that the us continues to support ukraine. i know what to wake up from russian bombs have already become too frequent a phenomenon that ukrainians are experiencing with courage and dignity throughout ukraine, we are with you, even more help is on the way, she wrote in the letter on the eve of the situation at the front and the continuation of security, economic and humanitarian support , the minister of defense shaluy do austin, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff mark milley and

the us president's national security adviser jake sullivan discussed the situation on the phone with ukrainian colleagues. the patriot anti-missile defense system, this information was confirmed by the pentagon on december 13 to the voice of america, and the official notification of the arrival of the patriot system may appear already this week, yuliya yarmolenko, who joins our studio from the white house, is following these latest events. congratulations yuliya so today you were at a briefing in the white house where, among other things , the issue of the patriot system was mentioned, at what stage is the transmission currently at, and do you know kyiv, natalya, at the moment john kerry a representative of the us national security council said that he could not confirm such a possibility of the transfer of patriot systems. he said that the united states is working on a new military aid package, but when the time comes, then will announce the details of this package, however, he emphasized that air defense is

the number one priority for the united states right now , especially in light of the latest attacks, not the latest of which happened today, russian missile and drone strikes against ukrainian targets, and our correspondents report that this announcement is indeed could happen as early as this week pat ryder is the pentagon spokesman the day before he also decided not to go into any details or officially confirm this information but he emphasized that the united states is constantly adapting to the needs that currently exist in ukraine, and now the greatest need for protection is the strengthening of air defense, so he said that the united states will continue to do everything possible so that the ukrainians have exactly what they need for protection now, this whole decision took quite carefully how the expert circles react to this step, yes natalya, once again it is about a decision that has not yet been officially announced, but there are a lot of positive reviews about it in the expert circles

in particular, at the institute of modern war, this is jonespencer , he says that this is a very important decision that, as he says, will help the ukrainians to protect themselves , in particular, from ballistic missiles and precisely those that russia now wants to buy. in iran, this is a development that is directly monitored very closely by the white house and the pentagon, in particular, may be related to its own decision about the possible transfer of systems to a patriot of ukraine, we also saw the reaction from tda lol, this is a democrat, a congressman, a democrat, a former military man, he thanked the president for this and said that in fact the best way to end the war is to give the ukrainians everything possible so that they can defend themselves against russian aggression. however, not everyone is extremely positive. it is also extremely expensive and very difficult to use, in particular, it is said

that in the united states, one of the patriot systems is represented by 9 military units that are actually are taken care of and despite the fact that only three people - three military personnel are needed to operate this installation directly on the battlefield in order to maintain it in order to establish communication . again, the question of training will be a big question. and when and if they will announce their own approval of the transfer of such an installation to yulia. the readiness of the armed forces of ukraine and the conduct of exercises that took place earlier, the movement of russian and belarusian military equipment took place, how washington reacts to these messages natalya we asked this question the day before the pentagon itself , our correspondent karla would have asked this question to pentagon spokesman pete ryder, and he said that at the

moment they do not see any significant signs that would indicate that there is a threat from the northern direction, but we continue to directly monitor this situation earlier, we also talked about this earlier they asked the white house and the white house also did not see a direct threat, but in the united states we know that they are very closely monitoring the development of the situation and of course they will report . we obviously continue to closely monitor the situation in the regions, including the development of events on the territory of belarus. crossing the border from belarus, as of now, so natalya, this week we will definitely be training according to new announcements, as they say in the pentagon, they are working

on horns, will there be patriot installations in it ? we will report thanks to yulia, i will remind you that yulia yarmolenko was in direct contact with us from the white house , 5 things are needed for ukraine's victory over russia, weapons and financial aid to ukraine, strengthening of sanctions against russia, the creation of a global of the anti-putin coalition and ukraine's membership in nato, with such a message, the former president of ukraine petro poroshenko arrived in washington, where, in particular, he took part in the conference of the international democratic union, where he received the award named after the former thatcher for freedom, about the views of the fifth president of ukraine on the current challenges facing ukraine, my colleague tatiana

spoke in english in order to make the interview accessible to other language services of voice of america, you just returned from a meeting in congress is now talking about a large aid package for ukraine worth almost 38 billion dollars, which the administration is asking congress to approve. what did it look like during your discussions? for the united states, ukraine is a top priority for both the congress and the administration. and the most important issue for the american people, which we brought up, was primarily the supply of weapons. a week ago, i returned from we were one of the first to visit kherson after the liberation. and a few days before that, we were near bakhmut. we know exactly what the soldiers are waiting for. this is a long-range

himars artillery system with a range of up to 300 km, because this way you can be in a safe position and attack ammunition depots with high accuracy. and the russian headquarters point number two - these are jet fighters and they are not offensive but defensive weapons they help us regain air superiority and protect ukrainian troops the third - and probably the most important - is anti-aircraft defense, we clearly agreed that the number and types of air defense will be increased, including saat, including the most modern missiles, the next issue is sanctions , restrictions are not only on oil, sanctions are not only personal, but we must block all russian exports for which the commercial fleet is used, so extraterritorial sanctions are now our main priority we must to stop the $1 billion per day that putin will still receive from the civilized world and at least half of this money is directed to the killing of ukrainians point

the third is the creation of a global anti-putin coalition in the style of rammstein. we need not only a rammstein in terms of weapons, but also an energy rammstein, a food rammstein, just don't let putin use energy, winter, food, refugees, or anything else as a weapon. and another very important point is the war a question of justice, and justice means that putin and the war criminals from his entourage should be put behind bars, so we should create an international tribunal on the basis of countries the g7 or the eu for the international recognition of russia's war crimes. but the most important thing we talked about was the future membership of ukraine in nato, the messages that they are trying to convey without this, we can not end the war without this, we cannot guarantee global security, european security , because putin will use this time to restore the combat capability of the russian armed forces in relation to drones, there were several strikes on

russian territory on russian airfields we do not say whose drones are these or can it be in your opinion changes and military and political calculations are not about military or political changes. this is simply the legal right of ukraine to return fire. we are not russians. we do not attack civilian infrastructure. we attack civilians. we attack . a cruise missile on ukrainian peaceful cities, ukrainian civilian objects, when ukrainians pay such a high price, russians should feel that war is not to sit on the sofa and watch on tv solovyov, no one in russia can feel safe until the war stops and the russian people. if they want to stop this process, they must put pressure on putin to stop the war , leave ukraine and admit war crimes, this is

the main goal of this attack, and believe me, this is only the beginning. i know that i say, when we talk about aid to ukraine from the united states, there is another factor that also relates to you, this is volunteer support, the ability of ukrainians to help themselves in ukraine, there are thousands of volunteer organizations, and yours is one of the largest were these topics discussed at valentine's meetings, the ukrainian volunteer movement is an absolutely unique factor for our victory together with the armed forces of ukraine, they were really impressed by how large a number of ukrainians participate in this russia and we are not only volunteers, we have a charitable organization that spent almost 50 million dollars for the delivery of everything necessary for the ukrainian armed forces and for the civilian population in the liberated territories, for example, now we are sending a generator from great britain and we

we deliver armored personnel carriers trucks for artillery already more than 300 such trucks for each brigade of the armed forces of ukraine to help speed up their offensive operation to liberate the territory of ukraine we deliver uavs with unique characteristics for artillery brigades that the fire of the ukrainian bug of war of the ukrainian artillery was accurate in all weather conditions you have met with putin many times you are one of the few people who can probably have some idea of ​​what he is thinking before a full-scale invasion begins he spoke about the security guarantee for russia avoiding the expansion of nato the denazification of ukraine is now almost open he is talking about imperialist conquests so what is he trying to achieve now and my advice that i give to our international partners regarding putin is only two positions first of all don't trust putin please don't be happy when putin

signs something, it means nothing, and secondly, he learns from the ukrainian experience. do not be afraid of putin and you will win together with ukraine, and now europe and nato need ukraine more than ukraine, nato, but this cooperation from which they will benefit. do you have an answer to this? no one in the world can understand why russia acts like this. the only possible reason is that putin is a maniac because we have no other explanation, but when i met with the leaders or opposition leaders of african countries against the background of id in washington because it is extremely important for us to create a global coalition to support ukraine and a global anti-putin coalition, now they do not need any additional explanations of what is happening because putin is using energy as a weapon and poor countries pay more for electricity they use food as a weapon and hunger threatens half a billion people around the world putin

uses the refugee problem as a weapon putin uses everything as a weapon and we need a scenario how to protect the world from putin how to putin putin and believe from my meetings here on i everyone understands washington's actions, that is, the problem is not only in russia, we will not simplify the issue here, because unfortunately many russians support putin and because of this bear joint responsibility for the crimes committed in ukraine and all of it is needed a reboot in front of everyone russia needs a process of putinization we have to stop russian influence in the world stop russian influence on politicians stop russian contribution to non-governmental organizations find russian influence no one says that ukrainians will do extremely well on the battlefield and in diplomacy if he were the president now would it be otherwise and well, my answer will be the same from the first day of the whole of greece. on

february 24, i came to zelenskyi and said that i am no longer the leader of the opposition and that you and i are both soldiers and that's why until our victory i don't criticize anyone i do everything possible to improve the situation that's why i'm at the front every week that's why i spend and do my best to provide everything necessary for both our soldiers and civilians and when someone says that we need diplomatic efforts to establish peace i think that we have a very strong diplomat and the name of this diplomat is the armed forces of ukraine, they conducted brilliant negotiations on the liberation of kyiv, they rejected russia from the kharkiv region with brilliant negotiations, and now they have a new diplomatic success in the kherson region, this is the door this is a very diplomatic answer to the diplomat. and how do you see the end of the war? for this, we need weapons, sanctions, financial aid, the anti-putin world coalition, so that nothing will happen , ukraine's membership in nato, when we have five of these

factors , the war will end . a member of nato, it probably won't happen until the end of the war. so, if this is one of the factors, it makes it almost impossible . we get a visa-free regime with the european union until the end of the war, we prove that we can achieve results and if there was no visa-free regime just imagine how many people would die without finding the opportunity to go to the european union, will the nation change or will the state change, ukraine will be different, without a doubt, ukraine will become better, i keep my fingers crossed and i i think that despite the very heavy losses we have , people, industry, the economy of the city, we will greatly

appreciate this payment that we give for the future of ukraine. thank you very much for the interview on december 14 in the european parliament the presentation of the sakharov prize for freedom of thought took place this year, it was awarded to the people of ukraine in the person of president zelensky, volunteers and leaders of civil society, as noted by the president of the european parliament, robert matzola, they protect our entire continent, our values, freedom , the rule of law and democracy, the nomination noted the role of emergency service volunteer yulia paevska human rights defender oleksandr matviychuk, the mayor of melitopol, ivan fedorov, as well as the movement of civil resistance to the occupation, the yellow ribbon maria prosku spoke with the founder and coordinator of the yellow ribbon, our

movement works from luhansk oblast to crimea, just from me as the coordinator depends on many such important issues of the management of all our help in the mini-company, so it is preferable to still remain so anonymous born in kherson worked in kherson for some kind of activism not very much, my father never spoke there, a participant in the orange revolution, the revolution of dignity, the truth is, he already took our whole family, that 's why i was a relatively small teenager, i served bricks, i honestly didn't expect from kherson

what kind of opposition, for example, can everyone there, who has not been to the south of ukraine, i think that everyone there is very pro-russian, but what happened in the first days of march and the last days of february, well, it ’s just not possible to describe normally with words how people just went out and stopped the russians’ equipment, it’s simple supernaturally, i would broadcast and after that if it had not fallen to the level of such about ukraine in terms of ukrainianism. in general, and so until the liberation day of kherson, then when they liberated there, well, hundreds of people came out and the atmosphere is still so festive. there was no such idea at all, we just wanted to be useful and knew that it would be ok propaganda

of the russians there with their television, newspapers, radio, what to do so that our population is not bombed, there is no internet yes, ok, we will cry tapes there, we will write with markers like the sun of ukraine, there were many yellow candles at my house come on, there are no tapes, we may have 50-70 activists there, i increased it, of course, these are small numbers. i mean, in principle , but do you consider this to be a combat unit that is ready for some kind of action, or is it a strie to write graffiti or somehow transmit useful information about collaborators, but it is very difficult in donetsk and luhansk coordinator because we were just in kherson, we all started here, someone was inspired there, acquaintances helped there in melitopol in crimea, everything is developing, we see such a positive

trend that they de-occupied some population centers in the kherson region, asking for more materials from the crimea, +5 people joined there, plus six spread some information when the entire right bank was liberated, we have an explosion in the crimea once again, something might happen somewhere i trained all the air defense forces over sevastopol by accident there in broad daylight op - in addition, some people shot who was there. here i will show you some more yellow ribbons. somehow it is all interconnected, we will simply receive a huge flow of information, yes. okay, there uncle styopa took a russian passport and before that the balance rests in this hotel, for example, we are just trying to do so. okay, they verified it somehow , confirmed it and simply passed on the information. we are not responsible for anything there, or they will be punished, they have already betrayed. this is betrayal of conscience, and it is not for us to judge.

it is not up to us to decide all these circumstances. we have a heart attack. they checked and handed over the yellow ribbon. she was able to be the voice of the occupation. and so that the people under control were able to support. not everyone has the opportunity to leave. i was born in kherson. i was born all my life . i would say the motto of one of our activists lilia in kherson, and even after the release, we when we meet, there are still postcards, i will glue them, you just glue them, they are twisted, they are sketched in the future, there is such a russian evil spirit, everything in kherson and there zet in the picture - until now pir, but we just want to continue to oppose all this, they have such a clear position in mariupol, the movement is active in mariupol, the symbol

of sports is active in them is the letter y, which we just introduced in kherson. we started working there in may with yellow ribbons, there now we see a crazy such an information boom and with posters of a mariupol resident ukraine there with the letter y people are actively working there, this is deserving of unreal support because the fact that the city and its residents survived this siege for 80 days plus they are in deep occupation and plus mariupol is such a huge center for the armed forces of russia and despite this constant danger, terrible humanitarian circumstances, people who have this flame for freedom, for struggle and do what they can

simply contacted us many months ago, the deputies appeared in the parliament and said we will demand candidates we want to propose you and then we have already seen that after all they were nominated and then together with the ukrainian people and public figures won the award surely this is a good example of the struggle of the people for their rights for freedom of thought and speech, for which it is nominated for the award, this is the great work of our activists who , despite some danger of torture, repression , even arrests, so to speak, and spending time at interrogations in basements, still fought for their own rights and freedom in the german city of cologne, a charitable organization blue - the yellow cross sends critically important cargoes of medical aid, involving

the owners of private planes, how this project works, see the story of khrystyna shevchenko from germany , the blue-yellow cross organization has been working since 2014 in the city of cologne and gathers around it the most active ukrainians of the region after the full-scale invasion of russia into ukraine, the main priority of its work has become medical aid, 80% of our countries go to purchase medicine, medical products, and our team created with the help of german and ukrainian doctors created several projects of a medical nature one of the main projects is the rescue backpack thanks to its contents in critical conditions, it is possible to save a medical person one of the main projects is the rescue backpack thanks to its contents in critical conditions, you can save up to five lives. this backpack is special. because it contains about 130 different medicines and medical products. this is how it

looks inside. it is necessary for the complete treatment of a patient, starting from diagnosis to the appropriate treatment of critical conditions, that is, just right. early people in wartime devices for diagnostics tourniquets splints for stabilizing the pelvis medicines volunteers make backpacks from carefully selected items recommended by ukrainian and german doctors, one such backpack costs 1000 euros and the organization sends hundreds of backpacks to hospitals all over ukraine, one doctor called well, from the territory of kherson oblast and said that they spent time in the forest with this backpack in the forest with a backpack, so for the organization, the speed of delivery of backpacks and other medical aid in ukraine was helped here by volunteer pilots, one of the good friends of the organization, a technician, and wolf tells how he found the first pilot who volunteered to fly

with a medical cargo, they are a good friend of stefan asked what we can do he pilot the idea was whether we could find five or 10 crazy pilots who could fly with us, so a separate organization ukraine air resku was created, which has about 380 pilots and which closely cooperates with the blue and yellow christ fox fleet and for you we had 40 flights i think more than 15 tons of medicines we have to prepare the flights we contact the pilots who can fly on a specific day then we have to plan the flight the pilots deliver the goods to the polish border in the blue-yellow cross is assured that the cooperation with the pilots has made the delivery process many times more efficient. we send the backpacks in concentrated, large batches by pilots, because the pilots fly four hours to the border, the truck takes

two days, then we choose, well, that is, we prioritize saving lives, and such flights with medical cargo take place every week during this time, he speaks in the organization and the pilot volunteers of the blue and yellow cross have become one big family, the pilots also spend their money to contribute to logistics. therefore, it is one big family that has been created currently helps ukraine pilots who cooperate with the blue and yellow cross organization come from 30 countries rock khrystyna and bohdan shevchenko voice of america watched the program of the ukrainian service voice of america time join our special broadcasts on social networks on youtube and facebook at 18:00 kyiv time gave on the live broadcast, you can ask questions to our best and journalists in the studio was nataliya leonova. thank you for trusting the ukrainian service of the voice of america. take care and have a peaceful night

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