Chancellor brings test device
Scholz rejects Russian PCR test
02/15/2022, 09:58 am
Before meeting President Putin, the Kremlin requires a negative corona test. However, Chancellor Scholz does not want to complete this in a Russian institution. Such behavior already had consequences for French President Macron a few days ago.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz has refused to be tested for corona by the Russian side before his meeting with President Vladimir Putin. Instead, the SPD politician decided to have the PCR test required for access to the Kremlin carried out by a doctor from the German embassy after landing in Moscow.
The Russian health authorities had been invited to be present at the test, according to the Chancellor’s environment. A test device was brought from Germany. Scholz himself, his entire delegation and the journalists traveling with him – together more than 50 people – had to present a total of three negative PCR tests before leaving Germany.
French President Emmanuel Macron also rejected a Russian PCR test during his visit to Moscow a few days ago. As a result, there was no handshake and drastic distance rules during the conversation in the Kremlin: Putin and Macron sat at the ends of a six-meter-long white table. At the press conference, too, the lecterns were several meters apart. “We know very well the importance of not shaking hands and not sitting at a long table,” one of the government officials told Reuters. “But we couldn’t let them get to the President’s DNA.” Before leaving France, Macron underwent a PCR test.
Scholz landed in Moscow in the morning, where a long conversation with Putin is planned for several hours in private. The focus will be on the Ukraine crisis, which is getting worse and worse. In the past few days, the United States has repeatedly warned of a possible imminent Russian attack on Ukraine. Russia dismissed this as “scaremongering”.