Ukraine envoy warns war fatigue would embolden Russia’s Putin further

Kyiv’s ambassador to the US Oksana Markarova said if the Russian leader isn’t stopped in Ukraine ‘he will attack other countries in Europe’

Markarova added she hasn’t seen any sign that the support for Ukraine is flagging despite its frequent requests for weapons and billions in financial aid

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Ukraine’s ambassador to the US Oksana Markarova. Photo: Bloomberg

Published: 1:45pm, 12 Aug 2022Updated: 1:49pm, 12 Aug 2022

Ukraine’s envoy to Washington cautioned the US and allies against fatigue over a war that’s costing billions of dollars in security assistance, saying it would be far costlier in the end to let Russia’s President Vladimir Putin go unchallenged.

“Can you simply say, ‘OK, let’s forget about Ukraine and do something else’? The answer is no,” ambassador Oksana Markarova said in an interview on Thursday.

If Putin isn’t stopped in Ukraine, she said, “it means that he will attack other countries in Europe” that are covered by Nato’s mutual defence pact. “And then everyone will have to fight, and it’s going to be much more expensive.”

So far, though, Markarova, whose home near Kyiv was occupied by Russians for 42 days, said she hasn’t seen any sign that the support for Ukraine is flagging despite its frequent requests for more advanced weaponry and billions in financial aid to help the government weather enormous deficits prompted by the invasion.

“Your best shot is to help us to fight and stop it while it’s still in Ukraine,” she said. Failure to block Putin now would only embolden him further, citing Russia’s push into Georgia in 2008 and its seizure of Crimea in 2014, she said.

As winter approaches in western Europe, Markarova, a former finance minister, acknowledged the prospect that Russia could cut off oil and gas supplies that remain crucial for heating millions of homes and powering industry.