Slovak Prime Minister: Russia needs security guarantees, and Ukraine is incapable of new counter-offensive

Robert Fico, Slovakia's Prime Minister, has criticised the West's strategy for Russia's war against Ukraine, saying that the aggressor country itself needs security guarantees and that Ukraine is incapable of a full-fledged counter-offensive.

Source: Fico, in a column for the Slovak newspaper Pravda, European Pravda writes

Quote: "Russia has responded to the security situation and Ukraine's pressure [on its way] to join NATO by violating international law by using military force without an international mandate. Big countries often do this."

Details: Fico noted that since the beginning of Russia's war in Ukraine, he has rejected a black-and-white vision and repeated Russian propaganda clichés about the "oppression of Russian speakers" that allegedly led to the battles in 2014 and that the United States had total influence over Kyiv.

In his opinion, the West misjudged the use of Russian military force as an opportunity to bring Russia to its knees.

"The West will take advantage of Russia's violation of international law, supply Ukraine with a lot of weapons, billions of dollars, burden Russia with massive sanctions, attack Russia's main mineral resources, and wait until the last minute, that a Ukrainian soldier will bring him the head of a Russian bear on a plate in the form of a militarily exhausted, economically ruined, internationally isolated and domestically politically undermined Russia," the Slovak prime minister writes, adding that he does not share this strategy of the West.

He says he is not one of those Slovak politicians who are happy that the Russian Federation is being turned into a mortal enemy in Slovakia, and he does not like the fact that Slovakia is being called an enemy country in Russia for this reason.

"It is literally shocking to see how the West has repeatedly made mistakes in assessing the situation in Russia. The facts are inexorable... Ukraine is not capable of a full-fledged military counter-offensive; it has become completely dependent on Western financial aid with unpredictable consequences for Ukrainians in the coming years," Fico says.

However, he predicts that weapons and money will continue to flow into Ukraine for some time to come – "but to no avail".

"It is obvious that the waste of human resources and money and the passage of time will not worsen Russia's negotiating position, but rather strengthen it, because in a few years, the international community will also start to organise a retreat, looking at reality," Fico said.

As he said, "it is absolutely clear to everyone" that the crisis in Ukraine has no military solution.

"If there is one thing I wish for, it is for the Slavs to stop fighting each other for geopolitical reasons, both from the American and Russian sides," Fico wrote.

The Slovakian prime minister believes that Ukraine has the right to follow its own sovereign path, not the one dictated by the EU: "If it sees itself in the EU, let it have this chance if it fulfils the conditions. We will be happy to help".

At the same time, he said, Russia also needs security guarantees.

"And I continue to believe that we have to go back to the recent European rhetoric that the EU and Russia are somehow connected vessels and that they need each other. As the Prime Minister of the Slovak Republic, I will not spread hostility towards any country in the world, and I also wish for a gradual standardisation of relations between EU member states and Russia," Fico said.

Background:

• After his appointment as prime minister, Fico has confirmed that he would not support military aid to Ukraine, as he said during the election campaign. He also opposes EU sanctions against Russia and wants to block Ukraine's accession to NATO.
• After a meeting with the Russian ambassador, Fico said that Slovakia should prepare for the period after the end of the war in Ukraine and for the normalisation of Slovak-Russian relations.

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