1. The rivalry between Olaf Scholz and Annalena Baerbock is clear – but they pull together on important issues
Are you Team Baerbock or Team Scholz?
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and her boss, Chancellor Olaf Scholz, work in the same government, but often appear very differently.
For the many Germans in particular, who currently have strong views on Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, Scholz's and Baerbock's positions sometimes seem quite contradictory - even considering that they are members of different parties.
"From the very first day of the war, Scholz and Baerbock took different paths on the thorny question of how many deadly weapons and which ones Germany should hand over to Kiev," writes a team of colleagues in the current issue of SPIEGEL about the rivalry between the chancellor and the foreign minister .
The story about the duel reads "quiet foot against loudspeaker".
A personal bond between Scholz and Baerbock did not arise in the first year of government together, according to the colleagues.
The differences are too great, and the distrust too great.
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Foreign Minister Baerbock, Chancellor Scholz
Photo:
CLEMENS BILAN / EPA-EFE
Sure, Baerbock seems empathetic, Scholz sober.
The chancellor obviously takes Putin's nuclear threats seriously and wants to have the nuclear power USA closely at his side, so that Putin cannot single out Germany as an opponent of the war.
Baerbock often sets small tips against Scholz and, in comparison, advertises much more urgently that the attacked Ukraine must also be helped with German weapons.
Scholz always seems to protect himself, Baerbock often advances in her interviews – and in at least one case had to be corrected by her employees afterwards.
The Green Foreign Minister and the SPD Chancellor also disagree on their policy towards China.
In terms of a value-based and feminist foreign policy, Baerbock wants to be tougher on Beijing.
Scholz, on the other hand, would like to increase the distance to China and reduce dependencies without pointing a finger;
his foreign policy approach is pragmatic, not idealistic.
All the same, Scholz and Baerbock agree that Germany needs a “national security strategy” like the Americans, British and French do.
But only in principle, not in the details.
"The chancellor and foreign minister are aware of the problematic image that they are presenting on the international stage," says my colleague Marina Kormbaki, who helped diagnose the difficult relationship between Scholz and Baerbock.
Scholz appeared at the Munich Security Conference today - and "was trying to dispel the impression of a divided German foreign policy," says Marina.
All partner countries that can supply battle tanks really have to do so, said Scholz.
"Defense Minister Pistorius, Foreign Minister Baerbock and I - also here in Munich - are campaigning intensively for this."
The message: Everyone pulls together.
My colleague thinks: »The fact that this message has to be placed so prominently speaks volumes.«
Read the full story here: She likes to do it that way.
Small tips against Olaf Scholz
2. The »Storykillers« project supports threatened journalists - by exposing the business of disinformation and intimidation
Investigative reporters often work at risk of their lives.
Colombian journalist Jineth Bedoya Lima was sent funeral wreaths and letters with a countdown from a young age.
"If you get one like that, it's a death sentence," she says in an interview with my colleague Nicola Abé, who spoke to her in Bogotá.
Enlarge image
Photo:
[M] Lina Moreno / DER SPIEGEL;
Photos: Federico Rios Escobar / DER SPIEGEL;
Bloomberg/Getty Images;
In 2000, Bedoya Lima was kidnapped, tortured and raped by paramilitaries.
"The order was to kill me," she says.
"As a clear warning to the press so that we stop reporting." Then there was probably a change of plan.
The interview with Bedoya Lima is part of the international research project "Storykillers" and blatantly sheds light on the background of the SPIEGEL cover story, which among other things deals with the fact that journalists are threatened and intimidated every day in many countries around the world, but also in Germany .
The cover story is first and foremost about a group of former secret service agents and former military personnel who have specialized in rigging elections around the world – for money and with campaigns of lies.
Disinformation and propaganda, cyber attacks on journalists have been increasing for years.
The research project "Storykillers" was initiated by the non-profit investigative editorial team Forbidden Stories, in Germany SPIEGEL, "Zeit" and ZDF were involved.
“Your job: voter fraud.
Your price: 15 million” is the title of the new SPIEGEL.
You can get the issue digitally here and from Saturday at the kiosk.
Since mid-2022, more than 100 reporters from more than 20 countries have been investigating the disinformation business, including the Washington Post, the Guardian and Le Monde.
The reason for the research was the murder of the Indian journalist and activist Gauri Lankesh.
She was shot by fundamentalists.
For years she was the enemy of extremists, lies were spread about her on the internet, she was threatened and denigrated.
The Colombian Jineth Bedoya Lima was researching the arms trade, among other things, when she was kidnapped, raped and tortured.
She has continued to work and has received numerous awards, the masterminds are still at large.
Bedoya Lima says journalism ultimately saved her life.
"Journalism is my oxygen, all I have."
Read the whole interview here: »How could I be a journalist and a victim at the same time?«
And the SPIEGEL cover story: Your order: falsify the election!
Her price: 15 million.
Her name: Team Jorge
3. A new Realo group wants to persuade the Greens to adopt a new migration policy – and probably also impress voters on the far right of society
"I'm not a litigator," Tübingen's Mayor Boris Palmer announced in SPIEGEL a few weeks ago, but Palmer is undoubtedly an enthusiastic quarrel.
It was announced today that Palmer is a co-signatory of a memorandum by Green politicians in which the current migration policy is criticized as ineffective and calls for drastic changes.
In view of the fact that the municipalities are currently clearly overburdened, the group, which calls itself a bit pompous »Vert Realos«, calls for »a different migration policy in Germany«.
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Boris Palmer is one of the most prominent signers of the memorandum
Photo:
IMAGO/Ulmer / IMAGO/ULMER press photo agency
The self-proclaimed realos lack a "concept for successful integration or the consistent return of refugees to their homeland as soon as this is justifiable or they want it themselves," according to the memorandum.
An immigration law for economic migrants is needed, but also "mandatory residence zones" for refugees at the borders and outside the European Union.
Asylum seekers without papers would have to be rejected or "remain in a state reception facility until their identity has been clarified".
A right of residence presupposes that refugees “fit into the social order” and accept basic values such as religious tolerance or Israel’s right to exist.
The proposals are likely to meet resistance within the Green Party because they call for a departure from positions that have been cultivated for decades.
The reason given is that acceptance of immigration is falling in Germany.
Palmer and his allies claim that a refusal to openly debate wrongdoing strengthens the "right fringe of society and parties."
Unfortunately, the memorandum seems to me a little as if the new Realos themselves wanted to woo voters from the right-wing fringes of society.
Read more here: Realo Group calls for a radical change of course in refugee policy
News and background to the war in Ukraine:
"Ukrainians need longer-range artillery":
More weapons for Kiev, no yielding to Putin: Influential US Senator Sheldon Whitehouse reaffirms Washington's position - and explains why he believes the aid is unshakable.
Russia is fleecing domestic companies:
the sanctions are not leaving Moscow as completely untouched as some critics claim.
The holes in Russia's budget are now so great that the corporations have to step in.
"There are places where the bodies just pile up":
Russia continues to send "waves of people" onto the battlefield to capture the city of Bakhmut, which has been fought over for months, Ukrainian defenders say.
But they are determined to hold their positions.
An oligarch loyal to Russia apparently campaigned on Facebook for a coup in Moldova:
Moldova is in a state crisis, and the president recently warned of a coup.
Now it comes out: According to a media report, an uprising in the country was advertised on Facebook until a month ago.
Alleged spy should reveal positions of US weapons system in Ukraine to Moscow:
A BND employee is suspected of having passed on secrets to Russia.
According to SPIEGEL information, he was probably paid royally – a six-figure sum of cash was apparently found on him.
"For the Russians, we are just the vassals of the USA":
ex-diplomat Wolfgang Ischinger warned early on of an attack on Ukraine, but also advocated Nord Stream 2.
Here he talks about German mistakes, scenarios for the end of the war - and SPIEGEL research on the consulting firm Agora.
Find all the latest developments on the war in Ukraine here: The News Update
What else is important today
First celebrity withdraws signature from Wagenknecht and Schwarzer:
Wagenknecht and Schwarzer have published a »Manifesto for Peace«.
One of the first signatories has now withdrawn his signature.
The political scientist Varwick sees no clear demarcation to the right.
Lindner puts together a billion-dollar relief package for companies:
Finance Minister Christian Lindner would like to lower the tax rates for companies.
Because the coalition partners are blocking themselves, the FDP man is now going a different way.
Tony Marshall is dead:
he became a star in 1971 with »Schöne Maid«: Tony Marshall was one of the faces of the German Schlager boom.
Now the mood singer has died, he was 85 years old.
Penises are getting longer:
Scientists have discovered that the average penis is growing.
But the results worry her - because male reproductive performance is getting worse and worse.
What we recommend at SPIEGEL+ today
“Bloated is an ugly word.
But yes, 3000 people is a lot«:
Could Germany repel an attack?
Here Defense Minister Pistorius explains how many tanks are actually being delivered, how he intends to tidy up his house – and what the armed forces urgently need to change.
Is the Union experiencing its yellow miracle?
The CDU is currently experiencing an unexpected high like the FDP two years ago - with the same risk: It could soon be revealed that there are no real answers to the crises of our time.
Vaccination against tumors and metastases:
The German company Biontech wants to conduct clinical studies on thousands of people in Great Britain in order to bring a revolutionary cancer therapy to the market.
Will tumor diseases soon lose their terror?
He put up a fight.
And how he did it:
he was known as a pole vaulter and famous as an extrovert athlete.
Then came cancer and Tim Lobinger went back into the duel.
"But" became his most important word.
Which is less important today
Enlarge image
Photo:
Per Morten Abrahamsen / Royal House of Denmark / picture alliance / dpa
Fearful queen: Margrethe II
, 82-year-old Danish queen, opened up in an interview about her friendship with Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and her views on the war in Ukraine.
She also spoke about her feelings during two meetings with the current Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2011 and 2014. Apparently she found the man to be afraid of: "I have never seen such cold eyes in my life".
Mini concave mirror
»Currently, an evacuation radius of 1,000 meters is assumed.
An extension to one kilometer may be necessary.«
Swr.de about an evacuation because of a bomb find
You can find the whole concave mirror here.
cartoon of the day
And on the weekend?
Could you watch one of my absolute favorite movies.
On the occasion of the Berlinale, ZDF is presenting the film in its media library that won the festival in 2017, it is called »Body and Soul«.
The Hungarian director Ildikó Enyedi tells the story of a man and a woman who work in a slaughterhouse and fall in love.
In their nights they dream almost the same dream, in which a stag and a hind in a snowy forest appear.
The film deals with the contrast between technology and nature, imagination and reason.
It's a great piece of magic about the power of the unconscious that brings happiness to some people in their dreams.
A lovely evening.
Heartfelt
Your Wolfgang Höbel, author in the culture department