Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy took his quest for more arms and support to a sprawling summit of some 50 European leaders in Moldova on Thursday, ending up the focal point of an event that seeks to quell regional conflicts and shore up unity in the face of Russia’s war.The meeting of the pan-continental European Political Community, which embraces all European nations other than Russia and Belarus, gathered the heads of state and government from 47 countries but its attention was on the continent's south and east — a region pushed to a turning point in its relationship with Moscow because of Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year.The 27-nation EU wants to use the summit to reach out to many Eastern European countries that spent decades either within the Soviet Union or under its immediate sphere of influence, and to bolster the continent’s unified response to Russian aggression.The choice to hold the summit in Moldova, a former Soviet republic of around 2.6 million people, is seen as a message to the Kremlin both from the EU and the pro-Western Moldovan government, which received EU candidate status in June of last year at the same time as Ukraine.Moldova, Europe’s poorest country which is cradled by Ukraine on three sides, aspires to join the EU by the end of the decade, and has consistently signaled its support for Ukraine and taken in refugees fleeing the war.Zelenskyy sought to dispel doubts about his country’s accession to the EU and NATO, and told the assembled leaders that such doubts would be exploited by Moscow.Zelenskyy called for a continuation of Western military aid to Ukraine, and insisted that all countries that border Russia should be full members of the EU and NATO.