In the first days of September, the Chairwoman of the Sejm’s EU Affairs Committee, Agnieszka Pomaska, together with her Bundestag counterpart Anton Hofreiter, visited Kyiv. Read the German MP’s account and his point of view on what is happening across our eastern border. In cooperation and unity there is strength!
‘This week I went to Ukraine with my colleague Agnieszka Pomaska, chairwoman of the EU committee in the Polish Sejm.
We cannot get used to this war: in Ukraine, just a few hundred kilometres from Germany, people are dying every day. It is children, it is mothers, it is fathers who are being ripped apart by Putin’s rockets. Like Yarina, Daryna, Emilia and Yevgenia in Lviv. Only father Yaroslavl survived. The attack happened the night we arrived in Kyiv.
One night, one day, one moment can change everything for the Ukrainian people forever. For more than 900 days, bombs have been falling on people who were playing in the garden yesterday, sitting in a café or going to work. People who were trying to go about their daily lives somehow, even though there is always no electricity, even though there are classes in the bunker, even though there is fear everywhere.
To break up Ukraine, Putin is waging a brutal war against the civilian population. In the coming months, millions of Ukrainians will face a terrible, cold winter without sufficient supplies of electricity and heat.
We must do everything in our power to support Ukraine and put an end to this madness. ‘For as long as necessary’ means that Putin decides how long people in Europe will suffer and die.
We must provide more support to Ukraine: humanitarian, financial and military. Only strength and determination can dissuade Putin from his chosen course. Strength and determination is the only way to any negotiation.
It is important to support Ukraine not only more strongly, but also more credibly. Germany must finally live up to its responsibility and its economic strength.
We are undermining ourselves by making the future support of Ukraine, i.e. security in Europe, dependent on figures like Orbán and Fico. But that is exactly what we are doing now, unilaterally relying on frozen Russian assets to fund aid to Ukraine.
The Ukrainian people are infinitely grateful for our support. In fact, we should be grateful to the Ukrainians. Putin’s aim is to destroy the West – its values, democracy and cohesion. Ukraine is fighting to ensure that this does not happen.
If Ukraine loses, Putin will continue until he achieves his goal. That is why Ukraine is fighting for us.’
