UKRAINE’S President Volodymyr Zelensky has mocked Russian rival Vladimir Putin as a “sick old man”.
And he insisted the tyrant’s nuclear threats would not stop Kyiv’s strikes on Russian soil.
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In a speech to mark Ukraine’s Independence Day yesterday Mr Zelensky said: “A sick old man from the Red Square, who constantly threatens everyone with the red button, will not dictate any of his red lines to us.
“Only Ukraine will determine how to live, what path to take and what choice to make. Because this is how independence works.”
It comes as Ukrainian soldiers continue to gain ground in Russia’s Kursk province as long-range drones blitzed airfields, oil refineries and ammunition depots.
Mr Zelensky warned nowhere in Russia was safe from Ukraine’s strikes.
And he added: “Our enemy will also know what the Ukrainian way of retaliation is. Worthy, symmetrical, long-ranged.
“They will know that sooner or later a Ukrainian response will reach any point in the Russian Federation that is a source of danger to the life of our state and our people.”
He also hailed Ukrainian troops and said: “You have preserved and are preserving our independence.”
Ukraine got independence in 1991 after the Soviet Union’s collapse.
Meanwhile Defence Secretary John Healey said the UK should be proud its weapons, including Challenger tanks, were “helping Ukraine protect itself and push back Putin’s forces”.
Ukraine has ratified a statute of the International Criminal Court, taking a step toward membership and opening the possibility of war crime prosecutions against Russia.
Prisoners swap of 115 each
By Jerome Starkey
RUSSIA and Ukraine have completed an exchange of 115 prisoners of war from each side.
Yesterday’s swap was the first since Ukraine’s surprise attack on the Russian Kursk region earlier this month.
The Russian servicemen were said to have been captured in Kursk and are now in Belarus.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky posted a picture online of his country’s POWs wrapped up in flags and hugging each other.
The arrangement was mediated by the UAE and is the seventh it has overseen since Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2022.
