Former Prime Minister of Ukraine Yulia Tymoshenko, in an interview with a British publication The Telegraph, said that any agreement, which provides for the ceding of territory to the Russian dictator, will encourage him to new conquests.
Hopes for a peace agreement with Vladimir Putin, which makes it possible to put an end to the war in Ukraine, are "illusory", the politician said.
According to her, the only solution now is to completely "finish" it by military means, despite the growing number of dead Ukrainian servicemen.
When Kyiv first came under siege, Tymoshenko carried a gun after being warned that she was on the Kremlin's hit list, which also included Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine.
The politician is indignant at the statements of those Western leaders who hint that giving up a part of Ukraine's eastern Donbas would be an acceptable price for peace.
France and Germany, we recall, initially expressed willingness to accept the idea, despite an apparent hardening of their stance at the G7 summit last weekend, when French President Emmanuel Macron declared that "Russia cannot and must not win."
Ms. Tymoshenko, who is the first and so far only woman to hold the post of Prime Minister of Ukraine, fears that as the economic cost of the conflict for Europe increases, the temptation to push Kyiv toward a peace agreement will increase.
She told The Telegraph: "I am surprised that some countries continue to try to pursue a policy of appeasement.
This is unacceptable for all of Ukraine. A peace agreement is an illusion, the only way out is victory in battle. Any such agreement would be the first step to the next war.
Despite heavy military losses, Putin continues the war, hoping that eventually there will be a split within NATO."
The leader of the Batkivshchyna party supports Zelenskyi's call to the West to provide Ukraine with more weapons to balance the conflict in Donbas, where Ukrainian forces are known to be losing up to 100 soldiers a day.
"The Russians have an advantage there in terms of artillery, perhaps 15 times, and the lack of weapons on our side - leads to a large number of dead."
The political career of Ms. Tymoshenko, one of Ukraine's most senior statesmen, reflects Ukraine's unstable post-Soviet path, a period torn by strife and Kremlin interference.
In 2004, she was one of the leaders of the Orange Revolution, during which mass street protests overturned elections rigged in favor of pro-Kremlin candidate Viktor Yanukovych. Dubbed the Slavic "Joan of Arc" at the time, she was heralded internationally as a champion of democracy, and her braided hairstyle was copied on the catwalks.
However, the Orange Revolution quickly turned into strife, which allowed Yanukovych to come to power in 2010.
Then Ms. Tymoshenko was sentenced to seven years in prison on charges of abuse of office in connection with the gas deal. According to her, the accusation was politically motivated. She was released after the second pro-Western uprising in Ukraine in 2014, when Yanukovych fled the country to Russia.
The politician lost to Mr Zelensky in the 2019 election, when the "comedian-turned-politician's" party won an overwhelming majority, but announced its support for him after the February invasion.
Despite the bloody rebuff that Ukraine was able to give to Putin, Tymoshenko fears that this war is far from over.
The Russian Empire may still try to occupy other parts of its former backyard, the politician warns, referring to Moldova, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, as well as the Scandinavian and Baltic countries.
Although Kazakhstan and Belarus are authoritarian regimes and allies of Putin, these countries have opposition movements that could distance themselves from the Kremlin if they ever come to power.
"I would advise these countries not to waste time, start building strong armed forces and become members of NATO, if they haven't already," says the Ukrainian opposition leader.
She also does not rule out that Putin will try to overcome failures on the battlefield with conventional weapons by using nuclear weapons, "the Russian leader is not so "suicidal" as to drop large-scale strategic atomic bombs, but he can use a tactical bomb of low yield, betting that that the West will not respond. He is ready to cross all the red lines and play against all the rules, that's the source of his strength."
Echoing the views of many Ukrainians, the Ukrainian politician is grateful to Boris Johnson for his military support for Ukraine, admitting that she was worried he might lose his job as a result of the Partygate scandal.
"He shouldn't have been partying during Covid, but frankly, it's not a comparable episode to what we're facing here in Ukraine," she said. "It's hard to see how his party could think of firing him."
When asked about fears that Johnson's support for Ukraine could lead to the involvement of NATO in the Third World War, she answered directly. "We are already in the Third World War, because now 50 countries are behind Ukraine. We need more weapons to crush the Russian army on the territory of Ukraine. This will be the end of Putin's regime, because the Russian people will not endure such a defeat."
