The murder in Berlin's Kleiner Tiergarten in August severely affected German-Russian relations. Now a diplomatic How-You-Me-So-I-You-Dir game is starting. Following the expulsion of two Russian diplomats from Berlin, Russian President Vladimir Putin has threatened Germany with a similar move.
"There is a rule: you expelled our diplomats, we expel your diplomats," Putin said on Monday evening after the Ukrainian summit at the joint press conference of heads of state and government in Paris.
The Russian diplomats have "nothing" to do with the alleged contract killing in the summer, Putin continued. "In Berlin, a warrior was killed, who was wanted in Russia, a bloodthirsty and brutal man," said the Russian president. The murderer had been a "bandit" and one of the organizers of the attacks in the Moscow Metro in 2010. However, he provided no evidence for this allegation.
Help is offered - and "well found"
Chancellor Angela Merkel said she raised the topic during her bilateral meeting with Putin in Paris and called on the Russian president to cooperate. "I assume that the Russian side will provide us with their information," said the Chancellor. "Anyway, I think that's good." Putin also said that because of the matter, there should not necessarily be a diplomatic crisis. "We have to help our German colleagues," he underlined.
The Georgian Zelimkhan Khangoshvili had been killed in the Tiergarten with shots in his head and body. Shortly thereafter, a suspect had been arrested while trying to throw the alleged murder weapon into a river. The man is currently in custody.
Meanwhile, the federal prosecutor's office has seized the investigation and informed that there is evidence of murder on behalf of state Russian entities or the Chechen Republic. Russia immediately rejected any involvement in the murder case. The killed man was active in the Chechen war on the part of anti-Russian separatists.