German Lawmaker Claims Current Health Minister Spoke Out Against Anti-Russia Sanctions

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German Lawmaker Claims Current Health Minister Spoke Out Against Anti-Russia Sanctions

BERLIN (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 27th March, 2020) German lawmaker from the Alternative for Germany party Robby Schlund on Thursday told Sputnik that Health Minister Jens Spahn essentially spoke against anti-Russia sanctions in his recent speech.

"Spahn said on March 25 in Bundestag's [Germany's lower chamber] healthcare committee that solidarity and mutual assistance at the international level, between countries that is, during the coronavirus pandemic are unprecedented and extremely necessary ... Thus he essentially called the sanctions against Russia absurd," Schlund said.

According to the lawmaker, the sanctions contradict the ideas of cooperation and solidarity and must be lifted in their entirety as a humane gesture and a contribution to the understanding between the two peoples.

"From my point of view, a minister from the ruling coalition [Spahn is a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's the Christian Democratic Union party] has clearly spoken out against the current sanctions," Schlund added.

Relations between Moscow and Berlin have soured after the reunification of Crimea with Russia and the conflict in eastern Ukraine as the European Union, together with the United States, introduced sanctions against Russia, to which it responded with counter-sanctions of its own. Since then, some EU politicians have begun questioning the effectiveness of sanctions and started looking for different solutions to problems between Russia and the European Union, especially during the COVID-19 outbreak.