Russia controls 20 per cent of Ukraine, 12 million people displaced: Zelensky
- Ukraine’s leader said that in 2014, Kremlin-backed separatists and Russian military controlled area size of Netherlands, but now oversaw territory ‘much greater’ than Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg combined
- He told Luxembourg lawmakers that an area more than twice that size is ‘polluted’ with mines and unexploded ordnance, and said 12 million Ukrainians have had to leave their homes – 5 million of them fleeing abroad
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said Thursday that Russia controls about one-fifth of his country.
“Today, about 20 per cent of our territory is under the control of the occupiers,” the Ukrainian leader said during a video address to Luxembourg lawmakers.
In 2014, he said, Kremlin-backed separatists and the Russian military controlled 43,000 square kilometres (16,600 square miles), an area he compared to the size of the Netherlands.
But that figure had increased to nearly 125,000 square kilometres since Putin invaded in February, territory Zelensky said was “much greater” than the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg combined.
He told lawmakers that an area more than twice that size – “nearly 300,000 square kilometres” – had been “polluted” with mines and unexploded ordnance and said 12 million Ukrainians were displaced, with more than five million of them going abroad.
The president also said Ukraine is “a de facto member of the EU. I believe that Ukraine is already showing by its actions that it meets the European criteria”.