‘See what concessions to Russia have led to…’

It’s hard to stay awake in most world leaders’ speeches, but this compilation by Ukraine’s President Zelensky packs a punchline

A MESSAGE FROM UKRAINE by Volodymyr Zelensky

144pp, Hutchinson Heinemann, T £9.99 (0844 871 1514),

RRP £9.99, ebook £9.09

World leaders take note: when writing a truly inspiring speech, nothing focuses the mind like a Russian missile with your name on it. This wisdom comes courtesy of a new book of speeches by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, the Churchill-in-a-T-shirt whose finest hour seems never-ending.

Stage fright is no obstacle for the former stand-up, yet his most effective address lasted just 32 seconds. It was day two of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and with Russian troops seeking to kill him outright, word spread that he had fled. On a walkabout through Kyiv that night, he took a video on his iPhone, keeping it brief to stop Russian drones tracking him down. “We are all here,” he said. “Our soldiers are here. Civil society is here. We defend our independence. And this is how it will always be from now on.”

As Arkady Ostrovsky, Russia editor of The Economist, writes in the book’s prologue, those brief words were a turning point. “There were rumours – spread by Russian officials – that Zelensky had left the country and that his government had collapsed. This half-minute video proved otherwise.”

Until then, Zelensky’s eloquence had fallen on deaf ears. At his opening address to the UN General Assembly in 2019, he reminded delegates that 13,000 Ukrainians had already died fighting Russianbacked separatists in the Donbas. He even brandished a bullet casing used to kill a Ukrainian reservist who had sung at the Paris Opera, saying: “It would be fatal to think that the situation in our country does not concern you.”

The world only listened to him once it was too late. Since the war began in February, Zelensky has become the planet’s most indemand speaker, soapboxing everywhere from the Commons to Congress, Israel’s Knesset and Germany’s Bundestag. Even so, he still makes a virtue of not sounding like a professional politician. Instead, Ostrovsky notes, he comes across as “an ordinary man thrust into extraordinary circumstances” – just like the

Ukrainian citizens who have been forced to take up arms.

This book collects together 16 of his speeches, but does not elaborate on how they are written, though it is understood they are crafted partly by former magazine columnist Dmytro Lytvyn. Whoever is behind them, they demonstrate a comedian’s knack for one-liners. Zelensky also knows how to tailor his comments to his audience – a vital skill, given most of his foreign broadcasts are to cajole Western governments into giving him weapons.

As Europe dithers in the run-up to the war, he browbeats delegates at the Munich Security Conference: “Russia has been trying to convince Ukraine that we have chosen the wrong path, that no help is coming from Europe. Why won’t Europe prove them wrong?” Addressing the House of Commons in early March, however, he is flattering – thanking Britain for military support, but pleading for more. “Please do what the greatness of your country calls upon you to do,” he asks.

He has much harsher words for the Bundestag a week later, over Germany’s reluctance to arm Ukraine for fear of jeopardising Russian gas supplies. “It is as though you are behind the wall again. Not the Berlin Wall, but another wall in the middle of Europe: a wall between freedom and slavery.” In April he singles out former Chancellor Angela Merkel, inviting her to Bucha to see what “concessions to Russia have led to”.

For Russians, meanwhile, there is a pithy plea to disregard Vladimir Putin’s propaganda. “The Ukraine in your news and the Ukraine in real life are two completely different countries,” he says. “The main difference is that ours exists.”

These are the quotable soundbites, of course. How many of these speeches end up being truly memorable in their entirety, only history will decide. But having had the dubious privilege of listening to many world leaders’ speeches as a Telegraph foreign correspondent, I can say one thing about this collection I can say about very few others: I read every single speech without nodding off. Zelensky comes across as variously genial, witty, personable and scathing. Not once did I sense windbaggery, posturing or the preachiness that so many leaders adopt when striding the world stage – proof, perhaps, that politicians are at their best in times of real crisis.