The Commander-in-Chief of the Lithuanian Armed Forces from 2014 to 2019 and the country's representative to NATO, Jonas Vytautas Žukas, said that former German Chancellor Angela Merkel allegedly prevented the Ukrainian authorities from defending the Verkhovna Rada of Crimea from russian forces in 2014.
In his book, he described how the German politician allegedly influenced the Ukrainian authorities during the occupation of Crimea, preventing Ukrainian soldiers from defending themselves against russian troops.
Welt reported this.
In a comment to Welt, Žukas noted that he was in the Ukrainian capital at the time. As the Commander-in-Chief of the Lithuanian army, he met with Oleksandr Turchynov, who was acting President of Ukraine until the inauguration of Petro Poroshenko in June 2014
Asked why Ukraine did not resist the seizure of the parliament building in Crimea, the Lithuanian recalled his conversation with Turchynov: "He told me that it was Merkel's request in a telephone conversation."
Welt also contacted a spokeswoman for Angela Merkel's office, who said she "does not comment on individual statements of opinion."
She also referred to the full text of Merkel's interview in Hungary and other public statements by the former Chancellor, including in her political memoir Freedom, published in 2024, "to which we have nothing to add, even given your questions."
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