Disagreements but desire for dialogue. Angela Merkel pleaded Friday in Moscow for the continuation of dialogue with Russia despite their opposition. The opportunity? Her last meeting with Vladimir Putin before the Chancellor left power, after 16 years in power and a complex relationship with the master of the Kremlin.
Vladimir Poutine also affirmed that this meeting was not “just a farewell visit”, but a “serious” meeting between these veterans of the European political life because “many questions must be discussed”, between a Russian-speaking who grew up in the GDR, and a German-speaking Russian president who served the KGB in East Germany.
Litigation Alexeï Navalny
On the “anniversary” of the poisoning of Alexei Navalny, this visit by the German Chancellor appears to be symbolic. Because after two days in a coma in a Siberian hospital, the anti-corruption activist was transferred to Berlin on August 22, 2020.
It was there that his poisoning with a Soviet military product, Novichok, was diagnosed and treated. Saved, he will accuse the Kremlin and its security services (FSB). Since then, the West, Berlin in mind, demands explanations from Moscow, which denies everything.
Chancellor Steffen Seibert’s spokesperson stressed on Wednesday that the Navalny affair “weighs heavily on the relationship with Russia” because he “is unjustly imprisoned”. French President Emmanuel Macron went in this direction, asking Vladimir Putin by phone on Thursday for the release of Alexei Navalny.
Ukrainian stalemate
The opponent thanked him on Friday from his prison, in a message on social networks, all those who saved his life and affirmed that he would continue his fight.
“I have a second chance to live, and to make whatever decisions I feel are right and honest,” he wrote.
Another hot topic for this latest Merkel-Putin meeting: Ukraine. Angela Merkel is trying with France to negotiate with Moscow a solution to the pro-Russian separatist conflict that has been tearing apart the east of the country since 2014, triggered in the wake of the Russian annexation of Crimea. But the process is deadlocked.
The Chancellor is also expected Sunday in Kiev.
But behind the angry subjects, Angela Merkel also has points of convergence with the Russia of Vladimir Putin.
The two veterans thus ultimately imposed on the United States, suspicious Europeans and Ukraine a submarine gas pipeline, Nord-Stream 2 which will increase the supply of Russian gas to Germany and Europe. for decades to come.