Zelenskyy Explained When Ukrainians Began To Hate Russians

It's impossible to just forget and forgive.

The crimes committed by Russian occupiers in the occupied territories—particularly in the Kyiv region at the start of the full-scale invasion—cannot simply be forgotten or forgiven, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy emphasized. He made these remarks on the podcast The Diary of a CEO, which was published on October 22.

“Bucha was genocide—universally recognized as such. They buried hundreds of people alive and tortured them. We found a mass grave containing about 500 people. Half a thousand people—a mass grave like that—just imagine: with their hands tied, tortured, and then buried in pits... When we liberated these towns [around Kyiv], hatred toward Russians emerged. Right at that moment. Not even when they launched a full-scale war. Back then, no one understood what that meant. But we realized what war was and what Putin personally had done when we found these mass graves of tortured adults and children,” Zelenskyy said.

He recalled how the Russians tried to prove that the evidence of their crimes in Bucha had allegedly been staged, and as proof of this, they pointed out that a large number of media outlets had immediately flocked to the scene. The president explained that when he learned what had been found in Bucha, he ordered that nothing be touched and that journalists be summoned there so the whole world could see it.

“It’s just that all of this happened a long time ago, during the first year of the full-scale war. And sometimes people need to be reminded. Imagine—excuse me, God forbid—if today in the U.S. or in Britain they were to find a mass grave containing 500 tortured people—adults, children—along with dogs and shot animals. They were holding a hunt there. People were running—they were shooting them; just a hunt, games like that. That’s what slavery is like. So how can you listen to Putin after that? How can you forgive after that?” Zelenskyy asked.

He emphasized that what he saw in Bucha changed his entire life. In particular, after that, he wanted to take revenge on the Russians.

“It was a terrible day. I’ve never seen anything like that in my life—bodies just scattered all over the road... You want revenge. I’ve never been in a situation where I couldn’t forgive someone. I believe people make mistakes. But this is something entirely different. It’s evil, the devil who came and turned people into meat. Meat, you understand?.. You want to find these people—who aren’t even human—and you want to kill them. I’ve never wanted to kill a single person. I’ve never felt that way. Only revenge,” said the President of Ukraine.

He added that such things cannot simply be forgotten and forgiven, although as president he has to remain calm and diplomatic.

“You can’t just forgive everything and say: ‘Well, sorry, that’s just Putin—a powerful country. Let’s just forget everything. Let’s forgive everything and somehow keep buying and selling gas and diesel.’ That’s difficult,” Zelenskyy said.

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