“No Wall Stands Forever”: Foreign Minister Macinka speaks at UN during high-profile US visit
During his visit to the United States, Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka addressed both the UN Security Council and a special session of the UN General Assembly, directly challenging Russia over its war in Ukraine. “Please, Honourable Representatives of Russia, tell your President Putin to stop this war,” he said at one of Tuesday’s meeting, marking four years since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Today marks four years since the launch of the war against Ukraine. Four years of bombed cities and drone strikes. Four years of divided families. Four years of trenches, minefields, and mass graves.”
This is how Petr Macinka (Motorists’ Party) opened his address to the Security Council, in which Russia holds a permanent seat. Drawing on history, he recalled the Berlin Wall as a symbol of Europe’s former division – separating, in his words, freedom from oppression, truth from propaganda, and the future from the past. The Czech foreign minister argued that such a wall now stands in Ukraine.
“It takes the form of the front line. It takes the form of occupied cities. It takes the form of children who learn to recognise the sound of missiles before they learn their letters.”
History, Macinka added, shows that no occupation lasts forever, and no army can break the will of a nation determined to be free. He stressed that Ukraine today “is not only defending itself”, but also the very principle of sovereignty and freedom. In closing, he addressed Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya:
“I wanted to tell him to tell people in Moscow to stop this war and give peace a chance,” he said, adding that aggression is not a sign of strength, but an admission of fear.
“You might seize territory, but you cannot seize the future”
Earlier in the day, at the UN General Assembly’s resumed eleventh emergency special session on Ukraine, Macinka again called on Russia to end the war, this time addressing the absent Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
“Minister Lavrov, I address you today not primarily as an adversary. I address you as a person who knows very well that no superpower wins a war against reality. You can temporarily control territory. You can temporarily control the narrative. You can create and control propaganda. But you cannot control time. And time always reveals who spoke of security — and who was dismantling it.”
Macinka strongly expressed the Czech Republic’s support for the proposed resolution, thanking Ukraine for submitting it and confirming that the Czech Republic would vote in favour. Titled “Support for Lasting Peace in Ukraine,” the resolution was adopted by 107 votes to 12, with 51 abstentions, including the United States.
At a time when some questioned whether the new Czech government might soften its stance on Russia, Macinka’s speeches sent a surprisingly clear message. During his US visit, he also highlighted the Czech ammunition initiative, through which Ukraine received 1.96 million large-calibre artillery shells last year alone. The programme’s future had initially been uncertain under the new coalition government, but now it appears to have full support.
High-level talks in Washington
Macinka’s visit to the United States, which began last Wednesday and concluded on Tuesday, attracted significant attention, largely due to his meetings with senior American officials.
On February 19, he attended the inaugural meeting of President Trump’s Board of Peace, which the Czech Republic has been invited to join. Participating as an observer while the Czech Republic monitors the positions of its EU and NATO partners, Macinka met Secretary of State Marco Rubio and briefly spoke with Vice President J. D. Vance. According to reports from Seznam Zprávy and CNN Prima News, he also spoke with President Donald Trump.
According to reports, Trump and Macinka discussed a post on Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social, in which the President praised Macinka for his performance at the Munich Security Conference. There, the Czech foreign minister had faced off with Hillary Clinton in an open panel discussion covering topics such as gender, the war in Ukraine, and the broader direction of Western civilisation.
Building on these high-profile interactions, Macinka suggested that the Czech Republic is gaining attention at the highest levels of American politics. “Marco Rubio assured me that the Czech Republic and other Central European countries are important to them and that they intend to give them attention,” he said, adding that he invited the Secretary of State to Prague.
The Czech Foreign Ministry informed on X that Macinka also held bilateral talks with Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau and with Andrew Baker, co-author of the new US National Security Strategy. Following their meeting, Landau posted on X: “I appreciate Petr’s commonsense approach to the issues facing both our countries. The only way to get our economies running on all cylinders (he’s the head of the Motorists’ Party) is by cutting regulatory red tape!”
Macinka’s programme further included meetings with representatives of the right-wing think tanks the Heritage Foundation and the Hudson Institute.
Overall, the visit can be viewed to have raised Macinka’s visibility internationally and may reflect broader Czech efforts to strengthen ties with Washington amid ongoing US–Europe tensions. When American journalists jokingly asked whether Macinka now had President Trump’s phone number, he replied that the US President’s primary Czech contact remains Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (ANO), noting that Trump had congratulated him on his appointment last year and spoken with him by phone.
How exactly relations between Prague and Washington will evolve remains to be seen.
You can listen to both of Foreign Minister Macinka’s speeches in full on Czechast, our English-language podcast about all things Czech, available wherever you get your podcasts.
