Germany will deliver new military aid to Ukraine worth 650 million euros, German Chancellor Olaf Soltz said today during a surprise visit to Kyiv.
"Germany will remain the main supporter of Ukraine in Europe," Soltz said in the election campaign before early parliamentary elections in Germany scheduled for February. Scholz wants to position himself as the chancellor of peace and a supporter of restraint to avoid escalation between the West and Russia.
His last visit to Ukraine was in June 2022, when he was visiting in the company of French President Emmanuel Macron, a few months after the start of the Russian invasion in February 2022.
"For more than 1.000 days, Ukraine has been heroically defending itself against the relentless Russian war of aggression," Soltz said.
His visit aims to express solidarity with Kiev, which can count on Berlin, an unnamed spokesman for the German government told AFP.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said last week that his country needs more weapons and security guarantees from NATO before possible negotiations with Russia.
Tensions are at their highest between Moscow and the West after the Ukrainian attack by American and British missiles on Russian soil and Russia's firing of an experimental hypersonic missile and nuclear threats.
Soltz arrived in Ukraine this morning to express his support for the country that is fighting against the Russian invasion, said a previously unnamed spokesman for the German government.
"Ukraine can rely on us. We say what we do. And we do what we say. To make this clear again, I traveled to Kyiv tonight: by train through a country that has been defending itself against a Russian war of aggression for more than 1.000 days," he wrote is Scholz on the X social network.
Reuters reported earlier today that Scholz made a surprise trip to Kiev, pledging new military aid worth 650 million euros and pledging that his country would remain Ukraine's strongest supporter in Europe.
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