German Chancellor Olaf Scholz led key cabinet members to visit Poland. The leaders of the two countries held talks in Warsaw on Tuesday (July 2) to discuss strengthening defense cooperation, historical reconciliation, and immigration policies.
According to Reuters, Chancellor Scholz and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk attended consultations between the two cabinets in Warsaw on Tuesday. This is the first face-to-face consultation between the two cabinets since 2018.
The meeting comes at a time when Europe is facing security challenges. Marek Prawda, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland, told Reuters that the meeting is “a dialogue to address concerns for the future”.
He said, “Due to the geopolitical changes in the world, the European Union is no longer operating as usual but is becoming a community of shared destiny, and we must at least adopt some policies to strengthen military capabilities in response to this change.”
With tensions escalating at the Belarus border and Russia’s missile attacks on Ukraine often leading to NATO aircraft scrambling in Polish airspace, security issues are becoming a major topic of discussion at the Warsaw meeting.
A German government source said, “The security of Poland and the cohesion within NATO are extremely important to Germany.”
However, despite the invasion of Ukraine by Russia prompting these two EU and NATO member countries to realize the importance of strengthening defense and becoming more united, there are still differences between the two on how to achieve this goal.
Tusk has been advocating for EU common funding for defense projects, but Scholz believes that the EU should not be involved in funding arms procurement or national defense budgets.
Moreover, 85 years have passed since the outbreak of World War II, and many Poles still feel that Germany has not made sufficient reparations for the war. World War II devastated Poland, causing the deaths of around one-fifth of the Polish population, including the vast majority of the 3 million Jewish Polish citizens.
According to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, Berlin will present a comprehensive plan that includes supporting defense along the eastern borders of Poland, providing funds for victims of Nazi Germany’s occupation, and constructing a memorial museum and gathering place.
The German government has approved funding for building the “House of Germans and Poles” in Berlin to commemorate the victims during the Nazi Germany occupation of Poland.