“Free the Leopards now!” the crowd chanted outside Olaf Scholz’s office on Friday evening. It is a demand that is being made with increasing urgency across Europe, as pressure mounts on Germany to send its prized tanks to Ukraine.
So far, though, Scholz is resisting those calls. Hopes had been high that a decision to dispatch German-made Leopards to Kyiv might come on Friday, at a critical meeting of western defence chiefs. But they were dashed.
Asked on Sunday if he could assure Ukraine that it would get German tanks without further delay, Scholz dodged the question. “We will proceed in the future as we have done in the past — co-ordinating closely with our allies,” he said during a trip to Paris. “It’s a principle that has served us well so far.”
