The incoming leader of Germany's conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), Friedrich Merz, has warned against suspending Russia from the international banking payment system SWIFT as a potential punishment for any Russian attack of Ukraine.
"Calling SWIFT into question could be an atomic bomb for the capital markets and also for goods and services," he told dpa ahead of German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock's scheduled visit to Ukraine and Russia on Monday and Tuesday. "We should leave SWIFT untouched," Merz urged.
"I would see massive economic setbacks for our own economies if something like that happens. It would hit Russia, but we would be damaging ourselves considerably," Merz warned.
He fears major repercussions not only for European-Russian trade in goods and services, but also for global trade. The suspension of Moscow "would basically break the back of international payment traffic," Merz said.
Baerbock plans to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba in Kiev on Monday, before travelling to Moscow for talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday.
Merz described Ukraine's request for arms deliveries amid a build-up of Russian forces on its border as legitimate. However, the new centre-left coalition under Chancellor Olaf Scholz has expressed reluctance over such a move.
"Just the deployment of troops on its eastern border poses a massive threat to the country, and in this respect I can understand the desire very well." However, the response should be European, he said.
"It is important that the European Union speaks with one voice here," the conservative lawmaker said, adding that before the German government made any commitments he wanted to know that there was a common European stance.
Russia has demanded ironclad guarantees from NATO that neither Ukraine nor Georgia will be admitted to the military alliance and that the US draw down its troops and weapons stationed in Europe.
NATO has rejected Moscow's demands out of hand, while also demanding the withdrawal of Russian troops from its border region with Ukraine and threatening Russia with massive sanctions should it invade Ukraine.
On the other major issue in German-Russian relations at present, the approval of the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, Merz argued that Germany had unnecessarily painted itself into a corner "by repeatedly yet falsely claiming that this was an exclusively private economic project of the energy industry. As we all know, there is nothing private and apolitical about the project."
"There is hardly a more political project in the global energy industry than this pipeline. So please, chancellor, stop telling us this story," he said, directly addressing German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
The Baltic Sea pipeline, which can transport natural gas directly from Russia to Germany, has faced stiff opposition by Washington over concerns about European dependence on Russian energy supplies.
The question of whether the pipeline, which has been completed but is still awaiting an operating licence from the German government, should ultimately be allowed to open was a legal one between the Gazprom-led consortium and the European Commission, Merz said.
"Politically, I would think it is right, given that Nord Stream 2 has now been completed and given all the mistakes made along the way, to put the pipeline into operation," he said, adding the caveat that Russia must honour its gas supply commitments to Poland and Ukraine in full. The pipeline should not be used "to blackmail" either country, Merz said.
After being elected CDU chairperson-designate by the party membership in December, Merz is due to assume the leadership of Germany's biggest opposition party at a conference on January 22.
