By cutting payments to Ukraine, the SPD showed that it ‘secretly longs for peace’ and increasingly supports its chancellor, Scholz, less

By cutting off payments to Ukraine, the SPD (Social Democratic Party of Germany) has shown that it “yearns for peace at heart” and is increasingly less supportive of its Chancellor Olaf Scholz. The German government has finalized the budget for 2025.

This was reported by the Swiss newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung.

“A day after the announcement, it becomes clear who came out as the loser in the ‘traffic light’ coalition agreement: Ukraine,” notes the Swiss Neue Zürcher Zeitung.

The German budget for this year and next year “does not provide for new funds” for Ukraine.

Berlin’s decision has led observers to speculate on who is behind it. The Swiss newspaper leans towards the figure of Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his SPD, which “yearns for peace at heart.” For example, this may be linked to the leader of the SPD parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Rolf Mützenich, as Mützenich, who belongs to the left wing of the party, “has repeatedly spoken out against arms deliveries to Ukraine and called for negotiations with Russia.”

The influential politician controls many deputies in his faction, and when he stated earlier this year that “not only should we talk about how to wage war, but we should also think about how to freeze the war,” he received loud applause from his party colleagues. As additional evidence of Mützenich’s role in reducing aid to Ukraine, the Swiss publication cites a letter from Scholz to SPD deputies.

In it, the Chancellor not only informed the deputies about the outcome of the budget negotiations but also “especially thanked Rolf (Mützenich) and the two party leaders (Saskia Esken and Lars Klingbeil) for their close coordination and advice during the negotiations with our coalition partners in the government.”

The newspaper suggests that Scholz is losing control of the party and faction, which are increasingly reluctant to support his course, against the backdrop of the unpopularity of supporting Kyiv.

“With a little more than two weeks to go before state elections in East Germany and a year before the federal elections, Scholz seems increasingly unable to convince his party of the need to continue comprehensive aid to Ukraine.”