German conservative leader Friedrich Merz expressed his shock at the statements of US President Donald Trump regarding the Russian invasion of Ukraine, DPA reported, BTA reported.
"This is a classic mixing of the roles of victim and executioner", Merz told public radio station RBB in Berlin. "This is the Russian narrative, (President Vladimir) Putin has been presenting it this way for years and, to be honest, I'm quite shocked that Donald Trump has now apparently bought into it," he added.
Merz is the frontrunner for German chancellor after Sunday's election, with his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU/CSU) party leading the polls.
"It is now important that European leaders quickly agree on a common strategy to deal with this issue," Merz said of Trump's outstretched hand to Putin.
Complaining and begging for a seat at the negotiating table is not the right approach, he added.
In one of his statements in recent days, Trump directly blamed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for the fact that the war in Ukraine, which Russia started, is still ongoing.