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Scholz shares insights into his phone calls with Putin

The chancellor himself and his spokespersons said previously that dialogue with Moscow was necessary and that Berlin was seeking to continue it

BERLIN, March 21. /TASS/. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Monday his telephone conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin had sometimes lasted up to 90 minutes.

"Those were long calls, sometimes they lasted an hour or an hour and a half. Some of those were in German, while at times we communicated through an interpreter," Rheinische Post quoted Scholz as saying at an event hosted by the German newspaper in Dusseldorf on Monday. According to the German chancellor, the conversations always stayed polite.

The chancellor himself and his spokespersons said previously that dialogue with Moscow was necessary and that Berlin was seeking to continue it. However, the German side pointed to "major differences" on Ukraine during such communication.

Scholz and Putin last had a telephone conversation on December 2, 2022.