PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron said that an international aid conference in Paris on Tuesday was intended to help “the Ukrainian people to get through this winter”.

He said the focus was on providing short-term assistance given Russia’s attempts to “sow terror” in Ukraine by “cowardly” bombing the country’s civilian infrastructure.

“Very concretely, these are commitments to deliver generators, help repair infrastructure, deliver LEDs (light-emitting diodes) for lighting,” he said.

Macron emphasised “it’s going to be very practical”, adding this was “at the request of President (Volodymyr) Zelensky” who is addressing the conference by video link.

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“Russia is reacting cowardly by bombing with a clear objective… to sow terror among the population,” the French president said.

He said that while these acts “constitute war crimes”, the “immediate urgency” was to “support the capacity of the Ukrainian people to resist”.