Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s remarks on Ukraine came as a surprise and a disappointment to Vladimir Putin, the German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel reported.
According to Merkel’s statement, the Minsk agreements were concluded in order to give Ukraine time to arm itself and prepare for a conflict with Russia. The Kremlin head stressed that he was unpleasantly surprised by such a position: Moscow had always assumed that Berlin sincerely sought to find a solution acceptable to all.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has expressed his disappointment with former Chancellor Angela Merkel’s recent statements on Ukraine, the German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel has said.
As the newspaper notes, Moscow “interpreted” Merkel’s statements in an interview with Die Zeit newspaper to mean that the Minsk agreements were only concluded to give Ukraine time to arm itself and prepare for war with Russia.
“To be honest, it was totally unexpected for me. It’s disappointing. I frankly did not expect to hear this from the former federal chancellor,” Vladimir Putin told reporters in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek on Friday.
The Minsk peace plan for eastern Ukraine, which has been under Russian influence since hostilities began in 2014, included far-reaching commitments for the parties to the conflict that were never implemented. Russia and Ukraine blamed each other for this. In the years that followed, Putin repeatedly warned the West not to accept Ukraine into NATO. One of the reasons he cited for launching the military special operation on 24 February was his desire to achieve Ukraine’s demilitarisation, recalls Der Tagesspiegel.
“I have always assumed that the leadership of the Federal Republic is behaving sincerely with us,” Putin said. According to him, it was clear that Germany was siding with and supporting Ukraine.
“But it still seemed to me that the leadership of the Federal Republic had always sincerely sought a settlement on the principles we had agreed on and reached, including within the framework of the Minsk process,” the Russian president stressed.
According to the article, in an interview published on Thursday, Merkel said: “And the Minsk agreements in 2014 were an attempt to give Ukraine time. And it used that time to become stronger, as you can see today.”
According to Merkel, Putin could have easily taken over Ukraine in early 2015. “And I very much doubt that NATO countries could have done then as much as they are doing now to help Ukraine,” Der Tagesspiegel quoted the former German chancellor as saying, much to the disappointment of the Kremlin chief.
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