BERLIN (AP) \u2014 German lawmakers on Thursday rejected a new call by the opposition for the government to send Taurus long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine, a day after Chancellor Olaf Scholz defended his refusal to supply the weapons.<\/p>\n
The main center-right opposition bloc has sought to keep up pressure on the issue and exploit divisions in Scholz\u2019s unpopular three-party coalition, even as the German leader tries to put a lid on the debate. On Wednesday, he told lawmakers that prudence is a virtue and rejected suggestions that he doesn\u2019t trust Kyiv.<\/p>\n
Parliament\u2019s lower house, or Bundestag, rejected the opposition Union bloc\u2019s motion by 495 votes to 190, with five abstentions.<\/p>\n
Germany has become the second-biggest supplier of military aid to Ukraine after the United States, but Scholz has stalled for months on Ukraine\u2019s desire for Taurus missiles, which have a range of up to 500 kilometers (310 miles) and could in theory be used against targets far into Russian territory.<\/p>\n
His position has frustrated the conservative opposition and parts of Scholz\u2019s own coalition. The criticism didn\u2019t diminish after Scholz finally offered a detailed explanation last month, pointing to his insistence that Germany must not become directly involved in the war.<\/p>\n
Lawmakers last month urged the government to deliver further long-range weapons to Ukraine but voted down a previous opposition call explicitly urging it to send Taurus missiles.<\/p>\n
Critics reject Scholz\u2019s argument that Taurus missiles could only be used responsibly with the involvement of German soldiers, whether inside or outside Ukraine. That, he said Wednesday, is \u201ca line that I as chancellor do not want to cross.\u201d<\/p>\n
The \u201csupposed prudence has always only fueled Mr. (Russian President Vladimir) Putin in his aggression against Ukraine \u2014 that is the result,\u201d opposition lawmaker Johann Wadephul told lawmakers. \u201cHe will only retreat if he is only forced to. Either we enable Ukraine to win the war or we will lose with it. There is no third way.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rolf M\u00fctzenich, who leads the parliamentary group of Scholz\u2019s Social Democrats, suggested that the debate was being driven by domestic political motives.<\/p>\n
\u201cGermany is the country that, after the United States, does most for Ukraine,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
A senior lawmaker with the Greens, one of Scholz\u2019s junior coalition partners, made clear that her party continues to back sending Taurus missiles but rejected what she called \u201cshop-window motions\u201d by the opposition. Agnieszka Brugger noted that any decision can only be made by senior ministers.<\/p>\n
But she said that \u201chesitation and procrastination also can ultimately contribute to escalation\u201d and rejected Scholz\u2019s attempts to shut down the debate. She said that France and Britain have sent similar missiles and that hasn\u2019t meant a further escalation.<\/p>\n
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BERLIN (AP) \u2014 German lawmakers on Thursday rejected a new call by the opposition for the government to send Taurus long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine, a day after Chancellor Olaf Scholz defended his refusal to supply the weapons. The main center-right opposition bloc has sought to keep up pressure on the issue and exploit divisions […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11381,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":""},"categories":[2464,8273],"tags":[933,1412,3361,5690,8296,8297,8298],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/German.jpg","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11380"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11380"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11383,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11380\/revisions\/11383"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brusselsindependent.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}