German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has reiterated his willingness to hold talks with Vladimir Putin to discuss a just peace in Ukraine, German daily newspaper Die Rheinische Post reported on Wednesday.
Addressing the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, ahead of an upcoming summit of EU leaders, Scholz reminded the chamber that Ukraine had consented to Russia taking part in a second Summit on Peace in Ukraine, which Kyiv has said it plans to convene by the end of the year.
“If we are asked whether we too will speak to the Russian president, it is only right, therefore, that we say yes, that is the case,” Scholz said, though he stressed that being willing to engage with Putin did not mean abandoning some clear principles, namely never making decisions without Ukraine.
Scholz said that every day, countless Russian soldiers became the “victims of the Russian president’s imperialist madness … and his expansionist policies”, adding that war should “not be happening again in Europe”.
On the eve of the G20 meeting in Brazil in November, Scholz indicated that he was prepared to consider holding a telephone conversation with Putin, according to European Pravda, an independent Ukrainian media outlet which focuses on the EU.
At the time the Kremlin said that Putin was also ready to talk to Scholz, but had not received a proposal to do so from Berlin.