Potsdam, Germany, Sept 16, (dpa/GNA) – Ukrainian boxer, Wladimir Klitschko, the brother of Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko, was to receive a media award in Germany on Thursday, on behalf of the Ukrainian people.
“Today I am using this award as a representative of the Ukrainian people, who are once again addressing the European Union, the so-called free world, the Germans and the German government,” Klitschko told dpa in an interview ahead of the event.
It is important “that they do not look away again,” he said in a reference to what he claimed was a lack of consequences, after the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014.
He said Western leaders had seen the devastation caused by Russian forces, since the invasion of Ukraine with their own eyes, and “still we don’t get what we need in a war … without the support of weapons this war will not be won.”
The M100 Media Award will be handed over in Potsdam, near Berlin, alongside an event on media freedom later on Thursday.
It was being awarded to Ukrainians who “with heroic courage, stoic fortitude and indomitable will … have been defending themselves against Russia’s brutal invasion for months now.”
“They are defending not only their own independence, but the independence of all of Europe,” the organizers said.
Some 60 international journalists are attending the colloquium on the war and the media.
The keynote speaker at the event is German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Vitali Klitschko, was awarded the M100 Media Award in 2014, as the representative of all democratic movements in Ukraine.
GNA