Former Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel defeated her position towards Russia in the pre-war period, and said that her influence wasn’t significant enough, writes BBC.
When she was close to leaving office, Merkel admitted that everyone knew it, and her political influence was deteriorating. She left the office in December of 2021, but before that paid a visit to Moscow in August. Although previous meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin always happened without other participants, this time, Putin brought in Sergey Lavrov.
Merkel recalls that feeling was clear – she has no influence in politics anymore, and that was all that mattered: «For Putin, only power counts.»
Merkel said to Spiegel that she doesn’t regret leaving the post because she knew her government was failing to make progress on the Ukraine crisis and also on the conflicts in Moldova, Georgia, Syria, and Libya, all of which involved Russia.
Other politicians have criticized her foreign politics. Christian Democrat (CDU) representative Roderich Kiesewetter said that Merkel (and other leaders of European Union countries) put too much on her «soft» politics and underestimated Russia. He added that before the war in Ukraine, Germany was too dependent on Russian gas. Merkel, however, pointed out that her position in Minsk’s peace talks gave Kyiv time to prepare itself for military aggression.
Angela Merkel spent four terms as chancellor.