Media reported about Scholz blocking a new €3 bln aid package for Ukraine

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has blocked a new billion-dollar package for Ukraine, which was promoted by Foreign Ministry and Defense Ministry chiefs Annalena Berbock and Boris Pistorius. This was reported by Der Spiegel on January 9.

It is specified that the ministers wanted to provide new aid to Kiev in the amount of €3 billion before the elections to the Bundestag scheduled for February 23.

According to the interlocutors, the defense ministry even prepared a list of weapons, which included three more IRIS-T air defense systems, including shells, missiles for the Patriot surface-to-air missile system (SAM), 10 howitzers and ammunition.

The magazine also informed that in response to the initiative, Scholz's office said that the 2025 budget already provides sufficient funds to help Kiev. In addition, they do not want to put the new FRG government before a fait accompli.

Earlier, on December 28, 2024, the former Ukrainian ambassador to Germany Andriy Melnyk put forward a demand to the FRG to annually allocate to Kiev at least €20 billion in the form of financial aid. He specified that Germany has allocated multi-billion dollar aid since the beginning of the conflict, but it is not enough.

Before that, on December 23, the German authorities together with Denmark allocated a new aid package to Ukraine, including 15 Leopard 1A5 tanks with spare parts. Germany also gave Ukraine two Gepard self-propelled air defense systems with spare parts, 65,000 rounds of ammunition for Gepard self-propelled air defense systems and two TRML-4D radar stations.

On November 26, German Foreign Minister Annalena Berbock said at a meeting of G7 foreign ministers that Germany was ready to transfer two more IRIS-T systems to Ukraine. One of them will be medium-range and the second will be short-range, the equipment should be delivered in December.

Western countries have stepped up military and financial support for Ukraine amid Russia's special operation to protect Donbas, which was announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 24, 2022, after the situation in the region worsened due to shelling by the Ukrainian military.