As early as April, a German armaments company offered to deliver 100 tanks directly to Ukraine. The Chancellor is said to continue to refuse an export license at the request of the Ukrainian Prime Minister Schmyhal. Scholz showed "no willingness at all," according to Kyiv.
According to a report by "Welt", Chancellor Olaf Scholz turned down requests from Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Schmyhal for more military support during his visit to Berlin. It was specifically about the delivery of state-of-the-art Leopard 2 tanks by the industry, the newspaper reported, citing information from Ukrainian government circles.
The background is an offer from the armaments group Krauss-Maffei Wegmann on April 8 for a direct delivery to the Ukraine. At that time, the company had already agreed to supply Ukraine with 100 Leopard 2A7 tanks, including spare parts and training units for soldiers, for a total of 1.55 billion euros. The first copies could therefore have been delivered 36 months after the conclusion of the contract.
However, Scholz rejected a promise for an export license. Rather, the chancellor remained "general and vague" in his talks with Schmyhal. Scholz had shown "no willingness at all" to change his negative position on the delivery of tanks.
On request, the chancellery told the "Welt" that they would not let up in supporting Ukraine militarily, but also politically, financially and humanitarianally. "We ask for your understanding that we generally do not report on confidential discussions," said a spokeswoman. Ukraine has long been pushing for more shipments of heavy weapons from Germany to better defend itself against Russian war of aggression.
