BERLIN: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke on the phone Friday for the first time in almost two years, a German government source told AFP.
Scholz stayed on the line with the Russian leader “for an hour,” the source said, without revealing the content of the conversation.
It was the first time the two had spoken since December 2022, which was the last known phone call between the Kremlin chief and the leader of a major Western country.
Putin has not spoken to most NATO and Western leaders since 2022, when the EU and the US imposed massive sanctions on Russia for launching its shock Ukraine offensive.
Within the NATO bloc, Putin maintains contact with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban—who is critical of Western policy on Russia—and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The call between the German and Russian leaders comes at a critical juncture in Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Kyiv’s forces are under increasing pressure as the war, which was launched by Russia in February 2022, heads into its third winter.
Germany has been one of Ukraine’s biggest military supporters, second only to the United States in the aid it has sent to Kyiv.
However, the election of Donald Trump to the White House, who criticized aid to Ukraine on the campaign trail, has cast doubt over Washington’s continued support.
Earlier, Scholz spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky before his first call to Putin.
Scholz talked to Zelensky “beforehand and will do so again after the conversation with the Russian President”, the chancellor’s spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Ukraine condemned Scholz call to Putin as an “attempt at appeasement” that Moscow would see as a sign of weakness.
“Talk only gives Putin hope of easing his international isolation,” Ukraine’s foreign ministry said.
“What is needed are concrete, strong actions that will force him to peace, not persuasion and attempts at appeasement, which he sees as a sign of weakness and uses to his advantage.”
“This is exactly what Putin has been wanting for a long time: it is extremely important for him to weaken his isolation,” he said. – AFP
