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Sahra Wagenknecht: Linke group wants to delete declaration of solidarity with Ukraine

2022-06-15T15:51:12.131Z


According to SPIEGEL information, a tough argument about how to deal with Russia is looming ahead of the Left Party Congress. A group around Sahra Wagenknecht wants to delete crucial passages of the main motion.


Enlarge image

Sahra Wagenknecht (on April 7 in the Bundestag)

Photo: Kay Nietfeld / dpa

Sympathy for Russia shaped the party line of the left for many years - because of the war in Ukraine, the party is now planning a course correction in Russia policy.

At the party conference in Erfurt the weekend after next, the left wants to take a clear position on the Russian attack in its leading motion and show solidarity with Ukraine.

But there is resistance to this.

A group of delegates have tabled an amendment that could spark heated arguments.

The motion will be published on the left's website on Thursday;

it is already available to SPIEGEL.

The approximately 50 people who want to fundamentally correct the party leadership's motion include Sahra Wagenknecht and her supporters in the parliamentary group, such as Sevim Dağdelen and Andrej Hunko.

Within the party, the supporters of the former parliamentary group leader are referred to as »car servants«.

Critical passages about Russia should be deleted

According to her wish, the declaration of solidarity with Ukraine should be deleted from the application.

The following passage should be completely deleted:

“We condemn in the strongest possible terms Russia's criminal war of aggression.

Our solidarity goes to the people in Ukraine who are suffering, who have to resist or who have to flee.

Our solidarity also belongs to the people in Russia who oppose the war, who desert and fear persecution for doing so;

the people who oppose war worldwide and support people on the run.«

And the group around Wagenknecht also wants to delete the following sentence from the main proposal: »For years, Russia has been pursuing a policy aimed at keeping the post-Soviet states under Russia’s influence: by trying to set up authoritarian vassal regimes or – where that isn’t succeeds – in destabilizing the states.« The reference to an »imperialist policy« by Russia, which legitimizes its policy with an »autocratic great power ideology«, should also be deleted.

Instead, the group is calling for additions that deviate significantly from the stance held in the lead motion and focus on other armed conflicts.

It says: "We condemn any breach of international law, whoever commits it.

Whether it's Russia's recent war against Ukraine, the illegal wars waged by the United States and its allies in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and elsewhere, or the brutal war waged by the Saudi Arabian-led military alliance in Yemen, the ban on violence our loyalty is to the UN.«

The supplementary text recognizes that Russia's war against Ukraine violates international law.

However, it is also said that one is not prepared to “detach the war from its geopolitical and historical context”.

In addition, other countries are indirectly blamed for the attack: "Years of demonstrative disregard for the security interests articulated by the Russian side led to this unjustifiable war."

At the party conference at the end of next week, the left wants to renew itself after a series of electoral defeats and internal quarrels and clarify questions that have been unresolved for many years.

The party leadership is also to be re-elected.

Sören Pellmann, member of the Bundestag for Saxony, will represent the Wagenknecht camp.

He recently tried to distance himself from the group on foreign policy issues.

His name is missing from the amendment.

The previous party leader Janine Wissler is standing for re-election, the EU co-group leader Martin Schirdewan and the left-wing MP Heidi Reichinnek are also running.

Source: spiegel

All news articles on 2022-06-15

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