Dhe Federal President’s trip to Warsaw had been planned for a long time, an inaugural visit to his Polish colleague Andrzej Duda for his second term in office. The short visit to Kyiv that followed, together with four other European presidents, should have been a gesture of solidarity. That’s why Frank-Walter Steinmeier immediately agreed when Duda suggested that the German head of state could get on the train to Kyiv after his visit to Warsaw alongside him, the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian presidents. Before that, they wanted to meet at the Polish-Ukrainian border station.
The undertaking seemed quite delicate: five presidents on a secret train across Ukraine on their way to Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Steinmeier hadn’t been on top for a while, Corona. Nonetheless, he accepted without hesitation. It was intended, he said later, to be “a strong sign of European solidarity with Ukraine”. Of course, the former SPD chancellor and foreign minister also knew about the anger towards him, the Ukrainian ambassador Andrei Melnyk announced his personal contempt loud enough. Even before leaving for Poland, Steinmeier himself had made an initial attempt to explain the failed policy on Russia in recent years, to admit mistakes that he had made “like others.” From Ukraine’s point of view, serious, unforgivable mistakes. Melnyk called Steinmeier’s statements “empty clichés”. On Monday, however, he went to the President’s Office to meet with Steinmeier’s staff.