After a video conference of the heads of state and government, Chancellor Scholz announced that he wanted to provide Ukraine with even more comprehensive support. The group of states is focusing on the reconstruction of the country.
Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz has promised Ukraine further support from the G-7 countries. After a more than one-and-a-half hour video conference call with the other heads of state and government late Monday afternoon, he said in Berlin that the G7 had managed to come up with a decisive response to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.
The economically strongest democracies in the world have moved even closer together. Democracy, the rule of law and human rights are the connection between the value partners who work together to support Ukraine and a just peace. “It is our unity, our determination that has led to the Russian President being all alone today,” said Scholz. He calls on Putin to “stop the senseless killing in Ukraine and withdraw his troops. This consensus goes beyond the G7. The G20 drew an important line at the Bali summit by calling the use of nuclear weapons absolutely unacceptable and urged Putin to return to international law.
According to Scholz, the reconstruction of Ukraine is a task for humanity
After his talks with US President Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron and the heads of government from Italy, Canada and Japan, Scholz assured Ukraine of the “unwavering solidarity” that would be shown as long as it was necessary. Specifically, the heads of state and government followed up on the expert conference organized by Germany in October and agreed on key elements for a platform for reconstruction. Its task is to coordinate the financial aid of all donors.
Scholz described the reconstruction of the destroyed infrastructure as a “human task, comparable perhaps to the Marshall Plan after the Second World War”. At the same time, the G7 kept up the economic pressure on Moscow, for example with the recently agreed oil price cap, a US initiative that President Joe Biden launched at the G7 summit at Schloss Elmau. At the same time, the oil market must also be stabilized in the interests of the global South.
Germany was particularly committed to supporting Ukraine with artillery and air defense. The military support was again intensified in the conversation, to which the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was also involved. He did not comment on the Ukrainian government’s demands for the delivery of Western-style main battle tanks. Foreign Minister Dmitro Kuleba said on Sunday in the “Report from Berlin” on ARD that there were no commitments in this regard. “But we’re working on it, quite openly,” said Kuleba. Ukraine does not understand why Germany is supplying artillery but not tanks.