Friede Merz is quite the auteur!

26. September 2025

The wri­ter is chan­cellor of Germany

Vla­di­mir Putin con­ti­nues his bru­tal war of con­quest against Ukrai­ne with unrelen­ting fero­ci­ty. Every resi­den­ti­al block des­troy­ed in Ode­sa, every night-time strike on a hos­pi­tal in Khar­kiv or on a government buil­ding in Kyiv dis­pro­ves the myth that Rus­sia is wil­ling to make peace. Euro­pe must draw the necessa­ry con­clu­si­ons from this, ide­al­ly tog­e­ther with its part­ners on both sides of the Atlan­tic. We must sys­te­ma­ti­cal­ly and mas­si­ve­ly rai­se the cos­ts of Russia’s aggression.

We do this not to pro­long the war, but to end it. Moscow will only come to the table to dis­cuss a cease­fire when it rea­li­ses that Ukrai­ne has grea­ter stay­ing power. We have that stay­ing power. Euro­pe is more tes­ted now than perhaps at any time in our life­ti­mes. Ger­ma­ny must — and will — assu­me a par­ti­cu­lar share of responsibility.

We need a new impe­tus to chan­ge Russia’s cal­cu­la­ti­ons. Now is the moment to app­ly an effec­ti­ve lever that will dis­rupt the Rus­si­an president’s cyni­cal game of buy­ing time and bring him to the nego­tia­ting table. That requi­res the cou­ra­ge and con­fi­dence to set our own agen­da, rather than merely react to his.

In doing so we would give the bra­ve peop­le of Ukrai­ne fresh hope. We would also send pre­cise­ly the right mes­sa­ge to Washing­ton: the path to a just and las­ting peace must be wal­ked together.

We will sup­port Ukrai­ne in its defence for as long as it takes. That is the decisi­on Euro­peans have made. The time has now come to back that poli­ti­cal pro­mi­se with an instru­ment that sends an unmistaka­ble signal of resi­li­en­ce to Moscow. In recent years, we have often play­ed it by ear. Now I am advo­ca­ting the mobi­li­sa­ti­on of finan­cial resour­ces on a sca­le that will secu­re Ukraine’s mili­ta­ry resi­li­en­ce for several years.

Ger­ma­ny has been, and remains, cau­tious on the issue of con­fis­ca­ting the Rus­si­an cen­tral bank’s assets that are fro­zen in Euro­pe, and with good rea­son. The­re are not only ques­ti­ons of inter­na­tio­nal law to con­si­der, but also fun­da­men­tal issu­es con­cer­ning the euro’s role as a glo­bal reser­ve cur­ren­cy. But this must not hold us back: we must con­si­der how, by cir­cum­ven­ting the­se pro­blems, we can make the­se funds avail­ab­le for the defence of Ukraine.

In my view a via­ble solu­ti­on should now be deve­lo­ped wher­eby — without inter­vening in pro­per­ty rights — we can make avail­ab­le to Ukrai­ne an interest-free loan of almost €140 bil­li­on in total. That loan would only be repaid once Rus­sia has com­pen­sa­ted Ukrai­ne for the dama­ge it has cau­sed during this war. Until then, the Rus­si­an assets will remain fro­zen, as deci­ded by the Euro­pean Council.

Such exten­si­ve assi­s­tance will requi­re bud­ge­t­a­ry gua­ran­tees from mem­ber sta­tes. Tho­se bila­te­ral gua­ran­tees should, as soon as the next Mul­ti­an­nu­al Finan­cial Frame­work is in place in 2028, be repla­ced by col­la­te­ra­li­sa­ti­on under the EU’s long-term budget.

The funds thus mobi­li­sed would secu­re Ukraine’s defence capa­bi­li­ties for several years. I will dis­cuss this pro­po­sal with the Euro­pean heads of sta­te and government at our mee­ting in Copen­ha­gen next Wed­nes­day. I pro­po­se that, at the Euro­pean Coun­cil at the end of Octo­ber, we give the man­da­te to pre­pa­re this instru­ment in a legal­ly secu­re manner.

That decisi­on should, ide­al­ly, be unani­mous — fai­ling that, it should be adop­ted by the lar­ge majo­ri­ty of mem­ber sta­tes who are firm­ly com­mit­ted to Ukrai­ne. We should also invi­te part­ners around the world that have fro­zen Rus­si­an assets to join the instru­ment. To this end, we will co-ordinate clo­se­ly with our part­ners in the G7.

For Ger­ma­ny, it will be important that the­se addi­tio­nal funds are sole­ly used to finan­ce Ukraine’s mili­ta­ry equip­ment, not for gene­ral bud­ge­t­a­ry pur­po­ses. Pay­ments should be dis­bur­sed in tran­ches. Mem­ber sta­tes and Ukrai­ne would joint­ly deter­mi­ne which mate­ri­el is pro­cu­red. In my view, such a com­pre­hen­si­ve pro­gram­me must also help to streng­t­hen and expand the Euro­pean defence indus­try. That would ser­ve both our collec­ti­ve secu­ri­ty and Euro­pean sovereignty.

In recent days we have been remin­ded of how com­pre­hen­si­ve­ly and sys­te­ma­ti­cal­ly peace and free­dom in Euro­pe are under thre­at. As Euro­peans we hold power­ful means to resist that thre­at. The time has come to use them, so that we may defend our secu­re, free and united Europe.

src: click

That Putin fel­low seems to real­ly deser­ve what he has com­ing to him!









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