German Chancellor Friedrich Merz accused President Vladimir Putin's Russia today of reaching the "deepest level of barbarity", on the eve of the fourth anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Agence France-Presse reported, citing his statement at an event organized in Berlin in support of Ukraine, BTA reported.
Merz also said that "Russia is not winning this war". Moscow "wants us to believe it, but the facts are completely different," he said.
Ukrainian resistance to Russian attacks is more effective than is often believed, the German chancellor stressed, citing surprising successes by Kiev's forces in recent times.
"In February we saw stunning territorial gains by the Ukrainian defense forces and the Russian economy is cracking under the weight of sanctions and military action - more than we can sometimes conclude from our own media here," Merz said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he believed Russian President Vladimir Putin "has already started" World War III, DPA reported, citing an interview with the British BBC television station published yesterday.
In a statement in Kiev over the weekend, ahead of the fourth anniversary of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine tomorrow, Zelensky said that his view of the conflict was different from that of US President Donald Trump.
"We have different views on World War III", Zelensky said in the interview, translated from Ukrainian. "I think Putin has already started it. The question is how much territory he will be able to seize and how to stop it."
Zelensky continued, saying that "Russia wants to impose a different way of life on the world and change the life that people have chosen for themselves. That is why I believe and have long believed that Putin has already started this war and we are not allowing it to turn into a large-scale Third World War."
The Ukrainian leader added that he relies on reliable guarantees for the security of his country from the United States, which do not depend solely on the will of the American president.