"We are the dogs of war," Paievska said as she introduced herself, explaining how she had started out as a volunteer and then worked as the chief medic at the hospital on the frontline during the siege of Mauripol. "I had children die in my hands, civilians, elderly. I do not know how you can forgive that. Thousands of soldiers have gone through my hands, thousands of civilians, streams of blood, rivers of suffering."
She had herself been captured, beaten and tortured, saying every day was a psychological and physical humiliation. "War, you know, it drinks our blood. It is never satisfied with our blood. It is always hungry. The more you give, the more she wants. But we made a commitment to our people."
She haltingly ended with an appeal. "To stop the war, we need to kill the war. Give us weapons to murder the war. We will manage, just help us a little bit."
It was a moment when those at the Munich Security Conference, a meeting of western politicians, defence officials and academics, sensed what was at stake. It rephrased the question that the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, had put to the conference. He asked: "Please don't ask Ukraine when the war will end. Ask yourself why Putin is still able to wage this war."
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