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Chancellor Olaf Scholz: "I am making it very clear to Putin that Russia bears sole responsibility for the war"
Photo: IMAGO/Fotostand / Reuhl / IMAGO/Fotostand
According to Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Russian President Vladimir Putin did not make any threats against Germany in their telephone calls.
"Putin threatened neither me nor Germany," Scholz told the "Bild am Sonntag".
Rather, the talks are an exchange of controversial positions: "Our very different points of view on the war in Ukraine become very clear in our phone calls."
Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a BBC interview published a few days ago that Putin had threatened him with a rocket attack in a telephone call in February 2022.
Johnson said he took it more as a rhetorical tool.
A spokesman for Putin had called Johnson's account a lie and said Putin had made no such threat.
“Russia attacked its neighbor for no reason”
Scholz spoke of an exchange of opposing positions in his talks with the Russian President.
"I'm making it very clear to Putin that Russia has sole responsibility for the war," the chancellor said.
"For no reason, Russia attacked its neighboring country in order to get hold of parts of Ukraine or the entire country." This is fundamentally against the European peace order.
That is why Ukraine is receiving financial, humanitarian and weapon support, said Scholz.
"Together with our allies, we are handing over battle tanks to Ukraine so that it can defend itself." When asked whether there was an agreement with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that weapons from the West would only be used on Ukrainian territory and Russia with them not being attacked on his territory, Scholz replied: "There is a consensus on that."
Russia has declared several parts of Ukraine its own territory.
In 2014, Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula and last year other parts of Ukraine.
Both steps are not recognized internationally.
Putin has questioned Ukraine's statehood and described Western aid to Ukraine as an attempt to break up Russia.
swe/reuters
