Polish FM criticises Angela Merkel for her words about Poland
Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski has denounced a statement by the former German chancellor, which was wrongly interpreted by German media as a claim that Poland bears some of the blame for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
These words did not appear in Merkel's interview - this was Bild's interpretation of her statement, according to which, in 2021, Warsaw and the Baltic States were against her proposal of a new format of EU-Russia talks.
"I wanted a new format where we could speak directly with [Russian President Vladmir]Putin as the European Union. Some people didn't support this. These were primarily the Baltic states, but Poland was also against it," she said.
On Monday, Sikorski was asked by reporters about Merkel's talk with Hungarian media outlet Partizan, which the German Bild daily described as an explosive interview, in which Merkel allegedly said that Poland bore some of the blame for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
"Let me interpret the words of the former German chancellor, Angela Merkel in this way: this is the same truth as Merkel writing in her memoirs that no one from Eastern Europe had protested against the Nord Stream gas pipeline," he replied.
"Let us not forget the reaction of the German government to the statement I had made in 2007 when I said that we do not like agreements above our heads. Mrs chancellor had visibly forgotten how her own government responded to our protests," Sikorski added.
Bild wrote in its article that Merkel blamed Poland and the Baltic states for the severance of diplomatic ties between Russia and the EU, which she said led to the invasion just a few months later. In fact, she did not make such statement.
In a YouTube recording of the interview, Merkel said that, in 2021, she felt that Putin was no longer taking the Minsk Agreement (which was to settle the conflict in the Donbas - PAP) seriously and for this reason, together with French President Emmanuel Macron,
she wanted a new format where the EU could speak directly with the Russian president.
A spokesperson for the bureau of the former chancellor told PAP that Merkel's words in German "speak for themselves and are nothing new." (PAP)
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