Olaf Scholz and Vladimir Putin spoke for the first time in two years

The Kremlin has not yet communicated about this telephone interview.

President Putin has not spoken with most Western leaders since 2022, when the EU and the United States imposed massive sanctions against Russia after the invasion of Ukraine. A number of Western leaders – Joe Biden, Emmanuel Macron… -, with the notable exception of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, refuse to speak to the Russian president.

At the beginning of November, Vladimir Putin regretted that Western leaders had “stopped” calling him. “If one of them wishes to resume contacts, I have always said it and I want to repeat it: we have nothing against that,” he said at the Valdai forum (Russia). Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began on February 24, 2022, Germany has been the largest arms supplier to kyiv after the United States.

This conversation comes in a very difficult context for Ukraine, which is preparing to experience its third winter under fire from Russia, with much of its energy infrastructure damaged or completely destroyed. With Donald Trump’s American presidential victory, the question arises of the sustainability of American support, which has enabled Ukraine to resist Russian troops since February 2022.