Kyiv has tried to patch up diplomatic relations with Germany after snubbing a planned visit by the German president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, saying it would welcome a visit instead by the chancellor, Olaf Scholz.
The snub to Steinmeier, who has a history as an advocate of close Russian-German economic ties, led to a backlash in Germany, with Scholz describing it on Wednesday as “confusing”.
“The president would have liked to go to Ukraine,” Scholz told RBB public radio. “It would have been good to receive him. I don’t want to comment further. It is a little confusing, to be polite about it.”
Separately, the ruling Social Democratic party (SPD) parliamentary group leader, Rolf Mützenich, said Ukraine should adhere to the minimum diplomatic standards.
He called on all democratic parties in Germany to defend the president, a member of the SPD, from unjustified attacks. Michael Roth, an SDP foreign policy expert in the Bundestag, described the cancellation as a “great disappointment” adding it was important both sides remained in conversation.
The Ukrainian ambassador to Germany, Andriy Melnyk, who has repeatedly clashed with German politicians – and Steinmeier in particular – said Scholz instead would be welcome. He had previously criticised the president’s visit saying Ukraine was not interested in symbolic visits that did not lead to the delivery of arms.
Scholz was asked on Wednesday if he planned to visit Ukraine but replied by saying he was in more regular contact with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, than almost any other western politician.
Germany has been seen as the constant backmarker in its support for Ukraine, blocking an EU-wide ban on Russian oil and refusing to provide heavy weaponry from its stocks on the basis that the weaponry was needed by the German army, or would be of little use to Ukraine defence forces untrained in the weaponry.
The Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych told German public television on Wednesday it had not been Zelenskiy’s intention to offend Berlin. “I think the main argument was different – our president expects the chancellor so that he [Scholz] can take direct practical decisions, including weapons deliveries,” he told the broadcaster ZDF.
The German president has a largely ceremonial role, while the chancellor heads the government.
Arestovych said the fate of the strategic port city of Mariupol and the civilian population of eastern Ukraine “depends on the German weapons we could get”, but that had not been promised. Ukraine would like Germany to send Marder infantry fighting vehicles.
Time is of the essence because “every minute that a tank doesn’t arrive … it is our children who are dying, being raped, being killed”, Arestovych said.
The German political class “has seen the terrible images” of the war that he said recalled the destruction of Berlin in 1945. What the Russian army was doing in Ukraine “isn’t any different”.
The former boxing world champion Wladimir Klitschko, the brother of Kyiv’s mayor Vitali Klitschko, told German media he hoped there would still be a visit by Steinmeier. “I hope that the visit of the German president to Kyiv will only be postponed and can be made up for in the coming weeks,” Klitschko told the Bild newspaper.
Scholz, whose matter-of-fact style often leaves his critics exasperated, has been under pressure from within his own coalition government to go further.
The Green party that runs the economics ministry and the Foreign Office has called for greater urgency, and been supportive of the transfer of heavy weaponry. There were also reports that Scholz’s office was even discouraging Green ministers from travelling to Kyiv.
Robert Habeck, the economics minister, said “it is of no use if we say in nine months you will get something. The stuff has to go down there now”.
The chair of the Bundestag defence committee, Marie Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, a member of the Free Democratic party (FDP) that is in a coalition with the SPD, visited western Ukraine with fellow committee members and advocated eastern European Nato countries hand over their old tanks and armoured vehicles to Ukraine, and in return receive replacements from western Nato countries.
The chancellor initially responded to the Russian attack on Ukraine by promising a dramatic about-face in German defence and foreign policy, including a big increase in military spending. But his critics say he has failed to follow that up with the supply of arms that Ukraine says it needs.
Germany has until now sent defensive arms, including anti-tank weapons, missile launchers and surface-to-air missiles in response to the conflict. It also says it has supplied more aid than any other EU country.
The snub to Steinmeier, which has divided German opinion, has probably set back the chances of a visit by Scholz. Steinmeier was due to visit with the presidents of Poland and the three Baltic republics on Wednesday.
Recently, Steinmeier has admitted to mistakes in Germany’s policy towards Russia, saying: “We stuck to bridges that Russia no longer believed in, and that our partners warned us about.” He had been one of the strongest advocates of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that would have made Germany even more dependent on Russian gas.
Kyiv regards these admissions of past error as only placing a greater onus on Germany to support Ukraine more urgently, and with greater practical measures.
Scholz was given a boost when Germany’s top economic institutes predicted a full EU embargo on Russian energy would trigger a major recession in Germany, sending output down 2.2% next year and wiping out more than 400,000 jobs. The analysis underscored his position that an energy embargo would damage Germany as much as Russia.
In practice, the immediate concern is whether Germany would accept a ban on Russian oil imports, the chief source of revenue for the Russian war machine. A full gas embargo is not currently under discussion in the EU.
