Chancellor Olaf Scholz has called for peace talks between Ukraine and Russia after meeting Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Frankfurt.
Mr Scholz told German television on Sunday that his government would continue to do “everything” to help Ukraine defend its country from Russian aggression.
A week after state election surges for two populist parties with pro-Russian leanings, however, Mr Scholz noted that “some citizens are not happy that we are supporting Ukraine”.
Post-election analysis revealed that eastern voters in Thuringia and Saxony were highly critical of the official German position on Ukraine and favour pushing Kyiv to sue for peace.
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The Ukraine question remains a dominant issue in advance of a third eastern state election in two weeks’ time in Brandenburg, where Mr Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) has governed since 1990.
An opinion poll from last Friday saw the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) overtaking the SPD for first place with a four-point lead on 27 per cent.
Mr Scholz told ZDF public television that “now is the time to discuss how we can get out of this war situation and towards peace more quickly than it currently seems”.
“There will definitely be a further peace conference,” said Mr Scholz, “and both the Ukrainian president and I are of the opinion that Russia has to participate.”
At a June peace conference in Switzerland Mr Zelenskiy said there could be another such gathering “tomorrow” if Russia withdrew from Ukraine’s territory.
The chancellor’s call comes at a delicate time in relations between Berlin and Kyiv. While Berlin remains Ukraine’s largest arms supporter in Europe, handing over 12 self-propelled howitzer cannons on Friday, Germany’s public prosecutor is less happy. It accuses Ukraine and Poland of frustrating its investigation into the bomb attack on the Nord Stream undersea pipelines almost two years ago.
Three of the four pipelines, carrying Russian gas under the Baltic Sea to Germany’s northern coast, were destroyed beyond repair on September 22nd, 2022.
German prosecutors accuse Polish authorities of allowing the chief suspect, a Warsaw-based Ukrainian diving instructor identified as Volodymyr Z, leave Poland for Ukraine after Germany filed a European arrest warrant.
German investigators believe that the man headed a six-person diving crew aboard a rented sailing yacht, Andromeda, that allegedly planted explosives on the pipelines.
In addition they suggest the team was trained for the mission in Poland and that Warsaw may have provided logistical support for the operation – claims Poland has called “completely unfounded”.
Asked twice on ZDF whether he “trusted” the Ukrainian president, Mr Scholz insisted he had “trusting” ties with Mr Zelenskiy.
“I have a good relationship with Volodymyr Zelenskiy,” said Mr Scholz. “And at the same time, it is absolutely clear to me that this matter must be cleared up.”
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