BERLIN, September 25. /TASS/. Leader of Germany’s Free Democratic Party Christian Lindner believes that Moscow needs to take certain steps for lifting anti-Russian sanctions.

"For FDP it is unacceptable what Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel has suggested, namely unilateral lifting of sanctions without certain steps of Moscow," the politician told reporters in Berlin.

"For us it is important to link consequences [of sanctions] to the readiness for dialogue," said the leader of party, which may join the ruling coalition after Sunday’s elections to Germany’s Bundestag.

The politician also confirmed his position on the need to leave Crimea aside in relations with Moscow. "We should not expect that the Kremlin’s position on this issue will change quickly, that’s why we need to look how to deal with this conflict and maybe settle it in the future," he said. According to him, the Free Democratic Party has never supported fueling tensions without studying the possibility of detente.

The West may also show readiness for dialogue with Moscow by discussing Russia’s return to the Group of Eight, Lindner has noted:

"Readiness for dialogue also implies, for example, to again speak in the G8 format with [Russian President] Vladimir Putin."

Russia was suspended from the G8 in March 2014 amid the crisis in eastern Ukraine and the group’s name was reverted to the G7 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States).

On Sunday, Germany held parliamentary elections. German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative CDU/CSU bloc won the polls, securing 33% of the vote, according to the official preliminary results published by Germany’s Federal Returning Officer Dieter Sarreither overnight.

The Social Democratic Party (SPD) comes second with 20.5% of the vote, the worst result in its history. The right-wing Alternative for Germany party will for the first time enter the Bundestag, with 12.6% of the vote. Some 10.7% of Germans backed the Free Democratic Party, while the Green Party and the Left Party took 8.9% and 9.2% of the vote, respectively.