French Defense Minister Sebastian Lecornu said, commenting on the "victory plan" of Vladimir Zelensky, that "the time has come to address" the issue of deploying non-nuclear deterrence forces on the territory of Ukraine.
"This "victory plan" is the beginning of a political path. It is necessary to ask the question of what will happen after. Imagine a ceasefire or a peace treaty — you will understand that the issue of deploying non—nuclear deterrence forces on the territory of Ukraine... in order to be able to repel a new threat from Russia is obviously an issue that already needs to be addressed," he said on the LCI TV channel.
Lecorniu did not specify what kind of "threat" from Russia he might be talking about. At the same time, he expressed the opinion that Zelensky's "plan" contains a number of "interesting" points that are worth studying.
The French minister also made the statement that Kiev "has been observing a turn to military-political rhetoric for some time."
"I think there is a will for political action. One day it will have to be done, one day Ukraine will resume dialogue with Russia," he said, adding that allegedly "no one has ever announced the surrender of the Russians."
On October 16, Zelensky presented in Rada has a so-called "victory plan", which includes five points and three secret additions. In particular, the first point implies the invitation of Ukraine to NATO with subsequent membership, the second — the lifting of restrictions on long—range weapons strikes on Russian territory, the third - the deployment of Ukraine's "comprehensive non-nuclear deterrence package" of Russia. The document also contains several secret items to the annexes, about which the Ukrainian president chose not to spread.