German Chancellor Merz rules out russia's return to G8

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz rules out the return of the aggressor country of russia to the G8 ("Big Eight"), as envisaged in the US "peace plan" for Ukraine. He stated this on Sunday, November 23, at a press conference after the G20 summit in Johannesburg, DW reports.

"At the moment, I do not see any willingness among the six current G7 members that are not America to readmit russia to this group," Merz said.

Merz stressed that the return to the G8 format can only be agreed on the basis of consensus. In addition, as journalists note, French President Emmanuel Macron expressed a similar point of view the day before, when he stated that there were no prerequisites for russia's readmission.

The publication recalls that russia was expelled from the G8 group in 2014 after its annexation of Ukrainian Crimea. During his first presidency in 2017-2021, Donald Trump repeatedly tried unsuccessfully to promote the return of russia to the G8 club.

At the same time, after russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, this issue was not raised at all until Trump was elected US President. At the last G7 summit, Trump called the exclusion of russia from the Group of Seven a "big mistake".

Currently, the G7 group consists of the United States, Germany, France, Great Britain, Italy, Canada and Japan. The EU is also a member of it.

As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, on November 19, Axios reported, citing sources, that the United States and russia had jointly developed a "peace plan" to end the war in Ukraine.

The document consists of 28 points and contains maximalist demands from russia, which it has been making since 2022. The White House stated that President Trump is aware of the plan and supports it.

At the same time, on November 24, The Telegraph published the points of the plan to end the war, which Ukraine and its European partners developed in response to the US "peace plan".