Finally! The Chancellor will travel to the Ukraine!
Together with French President Emmanuel Macron (44) and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi (74), Olaf Scholz (63, SPD) wants to travel to Kyiv before the G-7 summit – the BILD am SONNTAG reported exclusively.
The crucial question: What political message will Scholz convey to the Ukrainians?
The Ukrainian Ambassador to Germany, Andriy Melnyk (46), has clear ideas: “What my countrymen hope is that the Chancellor will come to Kyiv with a clear commitment to EU membership,” he said in the BILD talk “Die right questions” on Sunday evening.
Ukraine has long wanted to become a candidate for accession to the European Union. Melnyk continues: “It will take years, we don’t want a back door, we want a fair process.”
When it comes to arms deliveries, too, the Ambassador expects Scholz, Macron and Draghi “that we (Ukraine, ed.) will finally hear which weapons Germany can quickly deliver to the Ukrainian army”.
Melnyk finds double support in Anton Hofreiter (52, Greens). The head of the Bundestag’s Europe Committee said at BILD that Ukraine would be “an enrichment for the EU” – that’s why Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (41, Greens) has already acknowledged it.
Hofreiter rejected criticism of more arms deliveries to Ukraine: “It’s not about saying ‘whoever delivers weapons kills’, but rather the Russian army kills, murders, tortures, rapes. If you then say you are not supporting the victim, then that is simply failure to provide assistance.”
Germany has a special responsibility at this point, explained Hofreiter: “We still import large amounts of energy from Russia and transfer millions of euros to Russia every day, which is used to finance this war. What happens there happens partly with our money.”
The fact is that the traffic light government has high expectations of the Scholz-Kyiv trip.
FDP defense expert Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (64, FDP) told BILD that she expects clarity about the arms deliveries: “The Ukrainian President will articulate his ideas and wishes.
The Chancellor should then specifically promise him the delivery of weapons.” It is good that Scholz is traveling to Kyiv. Strack-Zimmermann clearly: “One way or the other, he should deliver.”
For the military expert Prof. Carlo Masala (54, Bundeswehr University Munich) it is clear: Scholz cannot come empty-handed!
Masala to BILD: “The symbolism of a visit to Ukraine is long gone! If Scholz, Macron and Draghi went to Ukraine without anything substantial, it would be a farce.”
He, too, believes in clear support for candidate status for EU membership. Masala thinks it is unlikely that further weapons deliveries, such as Leopard tanks, will be announced.