The Bundestag decides with a large majority that Germany supplies heavy weapons to Ukraine. CDU leader Merz is dissatisfied with the implementation of this direction by the Chancellery. He accuses Scholz of deliberate delaying tactics.
The CDU chairman and Union parliamentary group leader Friedrich Merz has accused Chancellor Olaf Scholz of disregarding the Bundestag decision to supply heavy weapons to Ukraine. Scholz does not act as decided in the Bundestag, Merz said in the evening on "RTL Direkt". "There are obviously delaying strategies in the federal government, at least one delaying tactic," Merz continued. Companies complained publicly because no export permits for tanks were issued. "They don't play with open cards here," criticized the CDU leader. "There can be reasons not to say everything, but then the chancellor should also express it. This fussing about the issues is not appropriate."
Chancellor Olaf Scholz had warned of a possible escalation of the war in an "RTL Direct Special" on Monday evening. When asked about this, Merz said: "The Chancellor has gotten used to a rhetoric that does not match what he claims to do with us." The motion for a resolution envisages a shipment of heavy weapons to help Ukraine.
"The chancellor talks less about that," said Merz. Instead, he constantly describes a risk of escalation, but this escalation threatens much more if Germany does not help Ukraine. "Putin will continue if we don't stop him." That's why Merz recommended the Chancellor "a little more consistency and stringency in his arguments".
Merz was also irritated by Scholz's statements about politicians' trips to Kyiv. "I find it strange that the Chancellor apostrophes the committee chair, the President of the Bundestag and the Foreign Minister as he said last night on this television program," criticized the CDU leader before a meeting of the Union faction in the Bundestag. Merz asked Scholz to finally travel to the Ukrainian capital himself.
Scholz had made it clear in the "RTL Direkt Spezial" that he only wanted to travel to Kyiv if there were specific things to be settled. He said: "I'm not going to join a group of people who do something for a short in and out with a photo shoot, but when they do, it's always about very specific things."
Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock from the Greens traveled to Kyiv last week as the first member of the government since the beginning of the war. Bundestag President Bärbel Bas from the SPD and the Chairwoman of the Defense Committee, Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann from the FDP, have also been to Ukraine. Opposition leader Merz himself was the first high-ranking German politician to be in Kyiv at the beginning of May and spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for around an hour. Merz now said that the way Scholz portrayed his cabinet colleague and representatives of the Bundestag "also shows a bit what the mood in this coalition is now and how we treat each other".
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