BERLIN, September 2. /TASS/. Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder (the Social Democratic Party of Germany, SPD, 1998-2005) branded his party’s election results in the eastern lands of Thuringia and Saxony as catastrophic and linked the failure to the party’s policy with regard to Russia, among other things.
"The result of landtag elections was dismally poor for the SPD," the DPA news agency cited the politician as saying. "The SPD, using the notion of a 'turning point' with regard to Russia, made a mistake, particularly in East Germany," Schroeder said. In his opinion, despite their criticism of Russia, now the Social Democrats must be a "force which will not be satisfied merely with arms supplies [to the Kiev regime] but will energetically push for talks between Russia and Ukraine" to end the conflict. In his opinion, such negotiations must be held "independently from the US."
At the September 1 elections in Saxony and Thuringia, the Social Democrats garnered only 7.3% and 6.1% votes, respectively. In Thuringia, this is the party’s worst result in any landtag elections. The subject of arms supplies to Ukraine played an important role during the election campaign. As a result, Alternative for Germany and the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, the two parties skeptical about supporting Ukraine, enjoyed enormous success. The notion of a "turning point" (Zeitenwende) has been repeatedly used by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in relation to the Ukrainian conflict.