PARIS, France, Feb 24, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - Vladimir Putin's war against Ukraine is a "triple failure for Russia", President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday to mark the four-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of the Western-backed country.

Hundreds of thousands have died since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, unleashing the deadliest war on European soil since World War II. "This war is a triple failure for Russia: militarily, economically and strategically," Macron said on X.

"One day, Russians will realise the enormity of the crime committed in their name, the futility of the pretexts invoked and the devastating long-term effects on their country." Macron said Ukraine had resisted despite everything. "Four years of lives shattered, of violence, rape, torture, war crimes and terror," he said. "But four years in which Ukraine has held on and resisted."

Macron also said that more than 1.2 million Russian soldiers had been wounded or killed. "This is the highest number of Russian combat casualties since the Second World War," Macron added.

The war, he added, "has strengthened NATO, whose expansion it sought to prevent, united Europeans whom it wanted to weaken, and laid bare the fragility of an imperialism from another age."

Macron pledged continued support for Ukraine and more sanctions against Russia.

"So that Ukraine can hold out and so that Russia understands that time is not on its side," he added. "To those who think they can count on our fatigue: they are mistaken." Macron was to co-chair a new meeting of Ukraine's allies on Tuesday.

"Today's new meeting must allow us to continue moving forward," he said.

Talks between Russia and Ukraine, relaunched last year by the United States, have so far failed to halt the fighting.