live ticker Ukraine war
“Regime change” in Moscow must be a German and EU goal, Eastern Europe expert Meister demands
NATO boss Stoltenberg for more arms deliveries – Putin plans new alliance
Russian troops continue to target energy supplies. This led to power outages in most regions of Ukraine. Meanwhile, NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg is calling for more arms deliveries to Ukraine. Meanwhile, Putin is trying to forge his own alliance.
Eastern Europe expert Stefan Meister accuses the federal government of not having a long-term strategy for dealing with Russia. A “regime change in Moscow” must be a goal of German and European foreign and security policy. More in the live ticker.
DAccording to the Eastern Europe expert Stefan Meister, Germany must strive for political change in Russia. “Deep regime change in Moscow must be a goal of German and European foreign and security policy,” said the political scientist from the German Society for Foreign Relations „Spiegel“. He accused the federal government of still not having a long-term strategy for dealing with Russia.
“What should the toolbox look like, which funds have to flow into which areas? I hear too little from the Foreign Office and especially from the Chancellery,” continued Meister. There is no coherent strategy for the entire post-Soviet space.
Since the attack on Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) has broken with the long-standing course of “change through trade”, but a “system of systematic irresponsibility” has taken its place, criticized the political scientist. Scholz “are hidden behind institutions like the EU and NATO”. Germany is in danger of falling back into old patterns of behavior.
Meister also sees the German civil service as responsible for this, as it shows “enormous persistence”. In all ministries there is “a large number of officials and employees who advocate good relations with Russia”.
All developments in the live ticker:
12:40 p.m. – Alert of air strikes throughout Ukraine
Air raid alarm is sounded in entire territory of Ukraine. Local officials warn of Russian missile attacks and urge citizens to seek shelter.
11:50 am – London: Russia is likely to use the turn of the year for missile attacks
According to estimates by British military experts, Russian missile attacks on the Ukrainian energy infrastructure might be intensified over the turn of the year. This emerges from the daily intelligence update from the Ministry of Defense in London on the Ukraine war on Saturday. According to this, the beatings have so far been carried out at intervals of seven to ten days. “Russia will almost certainly continue this pattern to overwhelm Ukraine’s air defenses,” the statement said. But there is “a realistic possibility” that Russia will strike once more in the coming days “to break the morale of the Ukrainian population over the New Year period,” it said.
10:00 a.m – Bas calls for further relief for low-income households
Bundestag President Bärbel Bas (SPD) has called for further support for people on low incomes as a result of the high energy prices caused by the Ukraine war. The energy will remain very expensive for the time being, said the Duisburg resident of the “Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung” (Saturday). “So I see an additional need for support for very low-income households in the country.”
She appealed to the federal government to focus the help in a targeted and sufficient manner on the people who really needed it when it came to additional relief packages. With the previous relief and energy price brakes, the government has so far managed to take away the greatest uncertainty from the people, said the President of the Bundestag. “The hot autumn conjured up by many did not happen. This is an important achievement.”
9:00 a.m. – Käßmann: Intensify contacts with Russia
The Protestant theologian Margot Käßmann has called for “massive peace initiatives” for the year 2023 in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The absolute destruction that Putin is driving in Ukraine must be stopped, the former chairwoman of the council of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) told the Düsseldorf “Rheinische Post” (Saturday). She is convinced that the call for more and more weapons will not bring a solution. There is no strategy behind it, because it is not clear where this should lead.
On the other hand, there must be serious cooperation with Russian civil society, said the theologian. The former bishop of Hanover said that she was opposed to the fact that city, scientific and cultural partnerships with Russia were now being ended. “We don’t need to cut ties with Russia, we need to intensify them to encourage the people of Russia to oppose the war in Ukraine.”
6:00 a.m. – 200,000 Ukrainian students – teachers “at the limit”
High school representatives are demanding additional support because of the large number of Ukrainian students admitted. Resources urgently need to be made available more quickly, said the chairman of the federal directors’ conference for high schools, Arnd Niedermöller, of the German Press Agency. “We cannot wait a year and a half before the new student numbers appear in the statistics and we can hire more teachers.” The teachers approached their tasks with full dedication and were at the limit, said Susanne Lin-Klitzing, Chairwoman of the German Philologists’ Association. representing high school teachers.
Both associations jointly surveyed the school administrations of more than 350 high schools in eight federal states. The survey makes it clear that many schools are struggling with scarce resources given the situation.
True, half of the respondents who took in Ukrainian students said that additional staff were hired for teaching. But that wasn’t the case for the other half. At almost every fifth school with Ukrainian students (19 percent), part-time teachers have increased their hours. Retired teachers came back for support at almost eight percent of these schools. Overall, however, the clear majority (68 percent in the country, 63 percent in the city) is of the opinion that not enough staff can be recruited for the tasks at the moment.