Linke leader Wissler wants to visit Ukraine together with a group of party colleagues and employees of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. But the plan is scrapped at short notice because details of the trip are circulating in public. Are they party friends who are responsible for the leak?
Left leader Janine Wissler will not visit Ukraine for the time being. The trip by a delegation from the party-affiliated Rosa Luxemburg Foundation was “cancelled at short notice,” reports the “Spiegel.” The decision was made “after the travel destinations and travel dates were publicly announced by the press,” a spokeswoman for the foundation told the magazine.
According to the report, Wissler wanted to embark on a five-day trip to the war country this Thursday together with employees of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation and party colleagues. The group wanted to visit Kyiv, Lviv and the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial.
The disclosure of specific travel destinations increases the risk of possible attacks. According to “Spiegel”, the foundation believes that it is therefore irresponsible for the delegation to complete their trip under these circumstances. In addition to Wissler, the group of left-wing politicians also included Berlin state chairwoman Katina Schubert and members of the Bundestag Martina Renner and Anke Domscheit-Berg.
“At the same time, it’s also about the safety of our partner organizations on site,” the foundation spokeswoman told the magazine: “Our foreign office and events with our partners have been the target of right-wing extremist attacks several times in recent years.”
What is explosive is that the “Junge Welt” was a left-wing newspaper that published the exact travel dates. The paper stands for more pro-Russian reporting and is therefore less in line with Wissler’s stance than with that of her party colleague Sahra Wagenknecht.
In the “taz” the left-wing politician Schubert criticized that the information was apparently passed on to the newspaper: “Here the security interests of our local partners and the participants were played with.” MEP Renner also criticized the process, according to “Spiegel”: “Whoever leaked it had an interest in sabotaging the trip.”
According to the report, the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation intends to continue with the trip. It is not yet known when this will take place.
Since the beginning of the war, the left has been struggling with its attitude towards Russia and the Western sanctions policy. At their party conference in Erfurt in June, Wissler’s camp clearly prevailed against Wagenknecht’s supporters, but a majority of the delegates passed a leading motion including a condemnation of the war. It also no longer rejects sanctions across the board. However, the critics of the official course repeatedly attract media attention. For example, the chairman of the Bundestag committee for climate protection and energy, Klaus Ernst, called for an end to the energy sanctions against Moscow.
