“Everyone who is in the occupied territories is a hostage of the Russian regime,” Ukrainian journalist and human rights activist Maksym Butkevych, who spent over two years in Russian captivity, told Euronews.
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00:00Hello.
00:01Hello.
00:02Ukrainian journalist and human rights activist Maxim Budkavich spent over two years in Russian
00:07captivity.
00:08He enlisted in the Ukrainian military in February 2022 and then got captured by Russian forces
00:13and sentenced to 13 years in Russian prison.
00:17Euronews met Budkavich in Brussels on the day when the delegations from the U.S. and
00:21Russia sat down for the first talks about Ukraine but without Ukraine at the table.
00:27He says anyone who thinks that Ukrainian people can be just ordered what to do plays right
00:31into the Kremlin ideology.
00:57He says that Ukraine and Ukrainians are instruments that were taken over by the Americans and Europeans
01:08and should be kept by Russia.
01:11I am afraid that other international actors and players who are now putting themselves
01:16in Ukraine's shoes, they show the same imperial approach that deprives Ukraine of its own
01:24subjectivity.
01:25And they are very much in this world view to Vladimir Putin, a war criminal, the initiator
01:31of the most terrible, most bloody battle in Europe since the Second World War.
01:39Any imposed territorial concessions would be unacceptable for Ukrainians, Budkavich says,
01:45especially for those living in the occupied parts of Ukraine.
01:51My biggest concern is the people who live in these territories.
01:54Because we are talking about millions of our fellow citizens.
01:58And judging by what I saw in Poland, especially what concerns civilians who are in Russian
02:04captivity, all those who are in the occupied territories are hostages of the Russian regime.
02:10I can't help but imagine that we will just say, yes, take the hostages of millions of our
02:18fellow citizens.
02:20I understand that some politicians of a large international scale are talking about this.
02:26But for me personally, this is unacceptable.