Merkel urges direct talks with Russia

Angela Merkel has urged EU leaders to negotiate directly with the Kremlin to end the war in Ukraine while ruling herself out as an envoy.

Merkel, who negotiated the so-called Minsk II accords in 2015 that failed to end a Moscow-fomented civil war in southeastern Ukraine, said that only current EU leaders would be “taken seriously” by Vladimir Putin.

“What I regret is that, in my view, Europe is not making sufficient use of its diplomatic potential,” she said at an event in Berlin on Monday.

The former chancellor, who enjoyed a strained but largely functional relationship with Russia’s leader during her sixteen years as German leader, pressed the case for diplomatic channels to be kept open.

“Military deterrence plus diplomatic activities,” she said. “That’s what I think is important.”

Her remarks followed speculation that she could act as the EU’s special envoy to end the four-year-old conflict.

Brussels has previously rejected Gerhard Schröder, Merkel’s…