Mark Laity, Chief Strategic Communications at SHAPE, NATO said taking part in the international conference in Brussels.

The international conference “War in Ukraine: where are we now and where are we going?” organized by the Ukrainian Think Tanks Liaison Office in Brussels in cooperation with the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies in Brussels on the 23^rd April, 2015 took place in Brussels.

The main conclusion of discussion was that we all are together in this war. It’s not an internal conflict, it is not a bilateral Russia – Ukraine war, it is an attack on the global security order, which ceased to exist.We should look for the responses to this attack at the national, European and international levels.

The key messages of the conference were: the hybrid war needs the hybrid response; we have to fight together in this war; European and international community should stand with Ukraine in order to defend themselves.

Mark Laity, Chief Strategic Communications at SHAPE, NATO said: “There are hundreds of Russian supplied tanks in Eastern Ukraine, and thousands Russians have gone into Ukraine to fight Ukrainians.”

Mykola Sunhurovskyi, Director of the Military Programmes, Razumkov Centre said: “Today, Ukrainian military has enough military personnel to hold back Russian aggression. Ukraine lacks defensive arms. This includes: anti-tank missiles, secured radio communication systems. These weapons are needed to conduct effective military operations.”

Oleksii Makeiev, Political Director, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine: “Since 12 February, when presidents of four countries negotiated the Minsk agreement we lost 65 of our soldiers, more than 200 wounded, and the number of shelling is more than 2000. If you ask me: “Is it a cease-fire?” I would say “No”. “Russia has broken the agreement at the moment of its signature. Ukraine sticks to the agreement: we hold the line, we don’t put our forces into direction of the military operations, we do not pretend to have more territorial gains. All we want to achieve in the course of the Normandy talks and during the meetings of the trilateral Contact group is to go along the sequence of the Minsk agreement and the Peace plan of the President.”

The panel discussion ‘Europe for Ukraine: Choice or necessity?‘ took place last week in Kyiv during the 5th International Arsenal Book Festval.