Following the atrocities in Buka, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelesnky blamed Angela Merkel for her policy towards her. Russia during her term of office. He even invited the former chancellor to visit the devastated suburb of Kiev to see for himself, as the President of Ukraine stressed, “what has led the policy of concessions towards Russia for the last 14 years.”
Fourteen years ago, then-Chancellor Angela Merkel and then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy spoke out at a NATO summit in Bucharest against Ukraine’s NATO membership so as not to provoke Russia. Today, President Zelensky describes the decision as a “miscalculation” that has left Europe with “the worst war since the end of World War II”.
The Merkel government ruled out sanctions in Russia and after the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and gave the green light to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which bypassed Ukraine. “How else can we interpret this attitude other than the tacit acceptance of a violent border shift by Moscow?” asks Henning Hoff of the German Foreign Policy Society.
Never has a Federal President been so strongly criticized by an ambassador
In an interview with the Tagesspiegel newspaper, Ukrainian Ambassador to Germany Andrig Melnik accused incumbent Federal President and Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier of treating “relations with Russia as sacred, no matter what happens. important role”. Never before in the post-war history of Germany has the country’s first citizen been so strongly criticized by a foreign ambassador.
The criticism is not about individual politicians, but about German foreign policy, security policy and trade policy for the last 30 years. Ukrainian Ambassador Melnik sums up: “Too much dialogue and too little cruelty towards the Kremlin.”
Andrig Melnik’s assessment is shared by political scientist Stefan Birlink from Regensburg University. Speaking to DW, he said: “Since Putin took office, good, non-violent relations with Russia have been more important than the fate of Ukraine. “This attitude eventually encouraged the Kremlin to invade Ukraine.”
In a similar style the policy towards Beijing
According to Stefan Birling, German policy towards China follows the same pattern: “Flattery with sought-after economic benefits, naive ideas about the liberalization of an empire from abroad, concessions to respect for democratic values ​​and human rights so as not to disturb the rulers.” European governments and Washington have been criticizing Germany’s policy towards Russia and China for years. But Berlin was not moved until Russian army invaded Ukraine on 24 February.
Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier publicly admitted on Tuesday after criticizing Ukrainian Ambassador Melnik “miscalculations” such as the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which hit Germany’s credibility.
According to expert Henning Hoff, the goal should now be: rapid de-dependence on fossil fuels, upgrading Germany as a major player at the military level depending on its weight in NATO and EU structures, and a ” common European policy towards Russia and China “.
DW
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