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Russia expects new German cabinet to build equal dialogue free of politicization — envoy

According to Sergey Nechayev, Russia is ready to cooperate with any German government elected by the German people

BERLIN, October 20. /TASS/. Moscow has experience working with all the parties that might form Germany's new cabinet and hopes for pragmatic relations with the future German government, Russian Ambassador to Berlin Sergey Nechayev said in an interview with the Berliner Zeitung newspaper published on Wednesday.

"Russia is ready to cooperate with any German government elected by the German people. We wish to continue constructive dialogue in the spirit of good-neighborliness and mutually beneficial cooperation," he pointed out. "We have experience [working] with all the parties that will now apparently join the cabinet and we do hope that a positive agenda will persist. On the other hand, sanctions, ultimatums and various threats are an obstacle," Nechayev added.

The envoy emphasized that Russia "maintained very good cooperation with [German] Foreign Ministers Genscher, Kinkel and Westerwelle (all of them members of the Free Democratic Party)." "We had good contacts with the Greens under the red-green coalition (consisting of the social democrats and the greens - TASS) that was led by Chancellor Schroeder and included top diplomat Fischer. Don't forget that the Nord Stream 1 project was launched under the red-green government," Nechayev noted. "That said, I expect a pragmatic and equal dialogue based on trust and free of politicization," he stressed.

The Social Democratic Party (SPD) won the September 26 Bundestag elections, securing 25.7% of the vote, the conservative bloc of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) and the Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU) received 24.1%, which turned out to be its worst result ever. The liberal Free Democratic Party garnered 11.5% of the vote, another 14.8% went to the Alliance 90/The Greens and 10.3% to the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany party. The Left Party, which received 4.9%, will also have representation in parliament based on three direct mandates. The Social Democrats, the Greens and the Liberals agreed to launch coalition talks on Thursday, October 21.