The CDU chairman and Union faction leader Friedrich Merz travels to Poland on Wednesday, where he will meet Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, among others. Talks are then planned in Lithuania, as the CDU/CSU parliamentary group said on Tuesday.
In view of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine and the “obvious failure of the exchange of rings, the Union faction considers it urgently necessary to maintain close contacts with the political leadership in Warsaw and Vilnius,” it said in justification of the three-day trip.
According to the information, Merz will be accompanied by four members of the Bundestag, including the chairman of the German-Polish parliamentary group, ex-CDU Secretary General Paul Ziemiak. A talk is also planned in Warsaw with Donald Tusk, the long-standing President of the EU Council and current Chairman of the Citizens’ Platform PO.
Merz then travels to Lithuania, where a meeting with Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte is planned for Thursday. He also wants to visit the base of the multinational EFP Battlegroup (Enhanced Forward Presence) on NATO’s eastern flank in Rukla, which is run by the Bundeswehr.
Merz wanted to gain a concrete insight into the work of the German soldiers in Lithuania, it was said about the trip, which was first reported by the magazine “Spiegel”. The return flight is scheduled for Friday. According to the report, Merz wanted to “smooth the waves” in Warsaw.
