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Robert Habeck and some other passengers took off their masks during the flight
Photo: Kay Nietfeld / dpa
Recordings from on board the government aircraft during the trip to Canada by Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck (Greens) have caused criticism.
Habeck and numerous journalists can be seen in the pictures without a mask.
On Sunday, more than 80 passengers, including 25 media representatives, were on board the Airbus A340 on the flight from Berlin to Montreal, Canada.
Photos and an ARD video show Economics Minister Habeck and journalists close together - without mouth and nose protection.
According to the federal government, however, this does not violate the rules for flights with the Bundeswehr Air Force: “There is no mask requirement on Air Force flights.
All participants of the trip must present a current negative PCR test before departure.
This ensures a high level of protection,” said a government spokesman when asked by the dpa news agency.
Politicians and Lufthansa spoke up on Twitter
Ex-CDU leader Armin Laschet wrote on Twitter that journalists and members of the government were "ignoring (nonsensical, but applicable) laws".
In October 2020, when he was Prime Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia at the time, he was criticized for a photo that showed him on a plane without a mask.
Lufthansa also spoke up with a comment in a Twitter thread: "A negative PCR test does not exempt you from wearing a mask." Former Berlin AfD parliamentary group leader Georg Pazderski criticized on Twitter: "Why do all passengers who fly from, to and in Germany, wear a mask, but not Marie-Antoinette Habeck?”
The accompanying deputy editor-in-chief of the portal “The Pioneer”, Gordon Repinski, wrote on Twitter that he considered the risk of infection on a flight before which all occupants had been PCR tested to be minimal.
»Does it still look stupid when such pictures become public?
Total.
It's one more example of how a patchwork quilt of rules only destroys trust.«
Scholz and Habeck want to conclude an "energy partnership for the future" in Canada
The reason for the trip to Canada is the plan for an »energy partnership for the future«.
Habeck said so after arriving in Montreal.
According to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, however, Canada will hardly play a role in the short-term supply of Germany with liquid gas.
At a press conference with Scholz, Trudeau referred to the long transport routes from the gas fields in western Canada to the port cities on the Atlantic, from which the gas would have to be shipped to Europe.
However, Canada is investigating “whether it makes sense to export liquid gas and whether it makes economic sense to export it directly to Europe”.
At the press conference, Scholz again pointed out that Germany was trying to expand its infrastructure for importing liquid gas as quickly as possible and was asking other countries to increase their production volumes.
Germany will need more liquid gas as part of the energy transition because it wants to get away from its dependence on Russian natural gas.
czl/dpa/AFP