Former Ukrainian President, Petro Poroshenko has called President of Russia, Vladimir Putin a mad man.

He said this while vowing that Russia will never capture Ukraine.

The ex-President, who was armed and surrounded by defence forces — spoke with CNN on Friday from the streets of Kyiv.

According to him, the people of Ukraine are ready to defend their country.

“Everybody should understand, [Russian President] Putin declared war, not for Ukraine. Putin declared a war on the whole world,” he said.

He called the Russian president “simply mad.”

“He’s just simply crazy,” he said, adding that it is just simply evil for the Russian leader to “come here to kill Ukrainian[s].”

While also thanking the U.S and U.K for providing Ukraine with defence weapons, the ex-President vowed that “No matter how many soldiers he kills, how many missiles he has, how many nuclear weapons he has, we Ukrainian[s] are free people with a great European future.”

He called for more help from world powers, saying that his country needs assistance, which could come in form of sanctioning Russia, kicking them out of SWIFT, and blocking their planes and ships in European and NATO ports.

He further confirmed to CNN that the battalion is about two to three kilometres (about 1.5 miles) from the fighting between Russia and his country’s soldiers.