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Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov
Photo: Yelena Afonina / ITAR-TASS / IMAGO
The Chechen ruler Ramzan Kadyrov is seen as an agitator in the service of the Kremlin.
He regularly provokes with martial statements such as the use of atomic bombs in the Ukraine war.
Now, in an interview in the propaganda program "60 Minutes," he has spoken about the return of Russian troops to East Germany.
"We have to return, this is our territory," Kadyrov said, referring to the Soviet occupation of East Germany.
He sees this as a justified reaction to the western supply of tanks to Ukraine.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz must be "sniffed" for his statements about Russia.
Kadyrov is a former Chechen separatist fighter.
At the end of the 1990s he switched sides and joined his clan in the pro-Russian government in the Caucasus republic.
In 2007, Russian head of state Vladimir Putin himself made Kadyrov president of Chechnya, an autonomous republic of the Russian Federation.
He is considered a man for the rough, in Russia he is known as "Putin's bloodhound".
Human rights activists accuse Kadyrov of ruling with Putin's blessing in the Russian republic of Chechnya with dictatorial power and of having his opponents tortured and murdered.
Kadyrov raves about victory
Kadyrov called the withdrawal of Soviet troops from East German territory a mistake.
Those responsible, such as former President Mikhail Gorbachev, who died last year, should have been punished as "traitors," said the 46-year-old.
Only by stationing troops would the Germans understand their place in the hierarchy, Kadyrov said.
He was unimpressed by a possible confrontation with NATO or an impending nuclear war.
He's not afraid of that.
"We will win and destroy them," he said.
Most recently, Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin sharply criticized the fact that German tanks would soon be firing at Russian soldiers for the first time since World War II.
He threatened not only to use tank technology against the attackers as a reply.
Kadyrov also boasted martial statements about Ukraine itself.
He believes he can conquer the country by the end of the year and conquer important cities like Kiev, Kharkiv and Odessa.
In fact, the Russian army has not achieved its goals even after almost a year in its war of aggression against Ukraine.
mrc/dpa