German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock launched a thinly veiled attack on Chancellor Olaf Scholz for blocking more military aid to Ukraine, accusing him of voting in the EU's largest country "Win a few votes quickly" at the critical moment, thereby jeopardizing European peace.
Berbock, whose Green party positions itself as Kyiv's strongest supporter in next month's federal election, said Scholz's refusal to approve an additional 3 billion euros in support for weapons purchases "really made me feel pain".
Berbock did not mention Scholz by name, but said she was disturbed that for some politicians "the question of how to quickly win a few votes in a general election is more important than the real responsibility of ensuring peace and freedom in Europe."
"Responsible politics doesn't mean going with the flow or changing direction during the campaign," she told Politico.
Support for Ukraine against Russian aggression has become a divisive campaign issue ahead of the Feb. 23 vote in Germany, with European countries seeking to increase support for Kyiv amid concerns that Donald Trump will scale back U.S. support when he next takes office as U.S. president. Aid Week.
Keir Starmer made his first visit to Ukraine as British Prime Minister on Thursday, meeting President Volodymyr Zelensky. Starmer, who has been criticized for being slow to visit Kyiv compared with his predecessors as Conservative prime ministers, pledged that the UK would use its "full force" to ensure national security.
Germany is Ukraine's second-largest military aid donor after the United States. Berbock and Defense Minister Boris Pistorius from Scholz's Social Democratic Party (SDP) have been pushing for extra funds to buy more military equipment to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia for nearly three years. invaded its neighboring countries.
The additional funding, which is in addition to the €4 billion already earmarked for 2025 in the interim budget, will be used to procure three new Iris-T anti-aircraft batteries as well as anti-aircraft missiles and artillery shells.
But Scholz has sought to appeal to voters who are skeptical of the NATO military alliance and fearful of Germany being drawn into direct conflict with Russian President Vladimir Putin, portraying himself as more wary and wary of Moscow.
The German chancellor said he would only approve the funding if the "debt brake" that severely limits government borrowing is temporarily suspended. "Otherwise the money wouldn't be there," he said Wednesday.
The prime minister, who has been trying to boost his party's approval rating above 16%, warned voters that the fiscally hawkish Christian Democrats (CDU), which leads the polls, would fund support for Ukraine by slashing social welfare spending.
The CDU has said it is willing to support a new Ukraine package, but not if it means issuing more debt.
Guntram Wolf, a fellow at the Brussels think tank Brueghel, said funding for the scheme was "not that trivial". The 2025 budget has yet to be adopted because Scholz fired his Liberal finance minister, leading to the Social Democrats and Greens forming a minority government and the collapse of his three-way coalition.
The deadlock could be resolved with a pre-election parliamentary vote, but Wolff said the chancellor was reluctant to hold a vote because it would be too divisive for the SPD.
"Scholz was deliberately vague about his support for Ukraine in order to speak to those in his party who were skeptical of sending more military weapons," he said. "These are very powerful people, so keep them on board in politics." It makes sense.”
The chancellor is also trying to avoid losing votes to the left-nationalist, pro-Russian Sarawak Wagenknecht bloc (BSW) by electing front-runners CDU leader Friedrich Merz and Green Party candidate for prime minister Robert Habeck described him as dangerously "hot-tempered".
He has refused to supply Kyiv with long-range Taurus missiles, citing concerns about escalating the conflict with Russia.
Merz has cast himself as a staunch supporter of Kiev and a more reliable partner to Western allies than Scholz.
But he has recently softened his rhetoric on the conflict and suppressed loud calls for supplies of Taurus missiles as he faces growing pressure from the pro-Russian Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. The far-right anti-immigration party ranks second in the polls, with about 20% support, about 10 percentage points behind the CDU.