US President Joe Biden said in Warsaw on Saturday that his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin should not stay in power after launching the invasion of Ukraine.
“For the love of God, this man cannot stay in power
,” Biden said during a speech at the Royal Castle in Warsaw, with a particularly harsh tone towards Russian President Vladimir Putin.
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Speaking directly to the Russians, he insisted that it is not the Russian people that he sees as the enemy.
"Let me say this if you are able to hear me - you, the Russian people, are not our enemy
," he said.
“I refuse to believe that you welcome the murder of innocent children and grandparents or that you accept that hospitals, schools, maternity wards are pounded by Russian missiles and bombs.”
“A long fight” ahead
“This war is not worthy of you, Russian people. Putin can and must put an end to this war
”, hammered again the American president.
But at the same time he felt that the conflict was not going to end soon.
The battle “
between democracy and autocracy”
will “not be won in days or months.
We must arm ourselves for a long fight in front of us”, he warned, before assuring the Ukrainians:
“We are on your side”.
He also reaffirmed that the United States did not want to come into conflict with the Russian forces that invaded Ukraine, but he issued a strong warning to Moscow:
"Don't even think about advancing an inch in of NATO”.
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“This war is already a strategic failure for Russia”
, added Joe Biden, who, applauded by some thousand people who attended his speech in front of the royal castle in Warsaw, immediately left for the airport, in front of return to Washington at night.
