German Chancellor’s party disagrees with his approach to supporting Ukraine

Social Democrat Michael Roth, chairman of the Bundestag’s Foreign Affairs Committee, has criticised the coalition’s approach to further funding for assistance to Ukraine. This coalition includes his own party.

Source: Roth in an interview with the Funke Mediengruppe newspaper, as reported by Die Zeit 

Details: Roth called it a “fatal signal” from the federal government towards Ukraine “if no further funds for new military aid are planned in future federal budgets”.

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Roth noted that the Ukrainian forces were back on the offensive for the first time in many months, and Ukraine now needs the full support of its most important military ally in Europe, Germany. 

Quote: “Instead, the debate about the future funding of military aid looks like a veiled abdication of responsibility from Germany. We cannot make our security dependent on budgetary constraints.”  

More details: The government’s draft federal budget for 2025, approved by the Federal Cabinet in July, allocated approximately €4 billion to help Ukraine, and this amount is not expected to change after the new budget compromise agreed on Friday. 

In principle, the German government expects that Ukraine will be able to receive more support in the future through interest from frozen Russian state assets.

Roth stressed that the US$50 billion from the G7 countries’ aid fund, which is also to be filled with interest from frozen assets, is “far from enough”.

Background: 

• Earlier, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung reported that the German federal government’s current budget planning does not provide new funds to support Ukraine.
• Chancellor Olaf Scholz requested that additional applications from the German Ministry of Defence for military assistance to Ukraine be no longer approved.
• At the same time, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said that these reports were incorrect and manipulative.
• Ukraine’s Ambassador Oleksii Makeiev warned that Germany’s costs would be much higher if Ukraine loses the war against Russia. 

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