Shadow Of Ukraine War Looms Over Security Conference

On the top floor of Literaturhaus in Munich, the Ukrainian veteran Yuliia Paievska was asked to speak to the elite of the transatlantic security and political establishment, including Hillary Clinton and the Estonian prime minister, Kaja Kallas, as they lunched on a three-course meal, served with military precision.

- Patrick Wintour 

"We are the dogs of war," Paievska said as she introduced herself, explaining how she had started out as a volunteer and then worked as the chief medic at a hospital on the frontline during the siege of Mari- upol. "I had children die in my hands, civilians, elderly. I do not know how you can forgive that. Thousands of soldiers have gone through my hands, thousands of civilians, streams of blood, rivers of suffering."

She had herself been captured, beaten and tortured, and said every day had been a psychological and physical humiliation. "War, you know, it drinks our blood. It is never satisfied with our blood. It is always hungry. The more you give, the more she wants. But we made a commitment to our people.

She haltingly ended with an appeal. "To stop the war, we need to kill the war. Give us weapons to murder the war. We will manage, just help us a little bit."

It was a moment when those at the Munich Security Conference, a meeting of western politicians, defensive officials and academics, sensed what was at stake. It rephrased the question that the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, had put to the conference. In phraseology reminiscent of President John F Kennedy, he had said: "Please don't ask Ukraine when the war will end. Ask yourself why Putin is still able to wage this war."

With Alexei Navalny dead, the Ukrainians retreated from Avdiivka, the US Congress deadlocked over supplying a further $60bn in aid and the shadow of Donald Trump's return to the White House hovering over any discussion, Zelenskiy's question could not have been more pertinent.