Scholz makes surprise visit to Kyiv weeks before no-confidence vote

Germany’s Olaf Scholz arrived in Ukraine on Monday for his second trip to the region during his tenure as chancellor.

His visit comes both at a time of escalated Russian attacks on Ukraine and as his government faces a political crisis at home that looks likely to remove him from power during elections in February next year.

Scholz promised an additional aid package to Ukraine during his visit, saying that Germany would deliver “further armaments worth €650 million” to the war-torn country.

The German leader has come under criticism for his approach to Ukraine, primarily due to his refusal to send powerful Taurus cruise missiles for Kyiv to use in its war efforts, which he has long argued would risk Germany becoming directly involved in the conflict.

Oleksiy Makeev, Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany, previously called Scholz’s refusal to send the weapons a “blank cheque for the Russians”.

Scholz drew further criticism in November after he spoke on the telephone with Russian President Vladimir Putin — a call that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said opened a “Pandora’s box” and undermined international efforts to isolate Russia.

Pivotal moment

Scholz’s visit comes both as he starts his own election campaign at home and as Ukraine struggles to fend off Russian forces in the conflict entering its third year.

The German leader has been keen to keep Ukraine on his domestic agenda as he kicked off his centre-left SPD party’s campaign over the weekend.

“When I talk about it, I am accused of instrumentalising the war,” Scholz said during his party’s first campaign conference in Berlin on Saturday.

“This war in Europe is an issue – whether the chancellor talks about it or not,” Scholz said in an attempt to criticise the leader of the country’s biggest opposition party, the Christian Democratic Union’s Friedrich Merz.

Merz, for his part, accused Scholz of deliberately playing on the population’s fears over the war between Russia and Ukraine for his own electoral success.

In Ukraine, increased Russian airstrikes have damaged the country’s infrastructure, and its forces are facing increasing pressure along the frontline.

In its latest report, Washington-based think tank the Institute for the Study of War said Saturday that Russian forces had recently advanced near Kupiansk, in Toretsk, and near Pokrovsk and Velyka Novosilka, a key logistics route for the Ukrainian military.

Scholz’s visit also comes amid widespread speculation about what a second term for US President-elect Donald Trump would mean for the conflict.

Trump has said he would withdraw US military aid to Ukraine and has repeatedly promised to end the conflict — although without giving information on how.

ADVERTISEMENT

On Friday, Zelenskyy said an offer of NATO membership to territory under Kyiv’s control would end the “hot stage of the war” in Ukraine. Zelenskyy insisted that a proposal to join the military alliance should be extended to all parts of the country under internationally recognised borders.

His proposals are at odds with those of Putin, who has said that any peace deal should acknowledge Russia’s territorial gains and security demands, including that Kyiv renounces joining NATO.