At a time when German-Polish relations are also tense, opposition leader Friedrich Merz visited Poland on Wednesday and Thursday before traveling on to Lithuania, where he visited the Bundeswehr's NATO contingent in Rukla and plans to meet Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte on Friday.

In Warsaw, the CDU chairman got a lot of attention.

It went without saying that he met a colleague from the family of the European People's Party, Donald Tusk, the former head of government and current leader of the opposition.

But Merz was also received by his opponent, whom he knew from earlier years, today's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.

A visit to Jaroslaw Kaczynski, head of the ruling national-conservative PiS, was also on the agenda.

The Polish side pointed out

Gerhard Gnauck

Political correspondent for Poland, Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania based in Warsaw.

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Berlin has been criticized in Poland for Germany's Russia policy in recent years and currently also for the planned tank ring swap in favor of Ukraine.

The progress of the ring exchange can best be described as "sluggish".

After the talks, Merz made it publicly clear that he wanted to be cautious abroad with anything that could look like a German "partisan dispute".

He also tried to "refute" allegations against the German address in terms of ring exchange, which he probably didn't quite succeed in.

According to Merz, Poland had given Ukraine around 250 older T-72 main battle tanks of the Soviet model, apparently trusting in German replacement deliveries, and has now started to deliver another tank.

At the same time, Poland's government had been in talks with the federal government about replacements from German stocks, but, as some politicians openly said, feels "deceived".

Government spokesman Piotr Müller declared Germany's planned arms deliveries as "unsatisfactory" on Thursday.

Merz said in the garden of the German embassy: "The Poles have delivered.

It shows what this country is ready to do.” 250 tanks, that's almost a third of Poland's total (which already includes Leopard 2 tanks).

When asked why there was now a dispute with Berlin about the lack of replacements from Germany, the CDU leader said: "A firm agreement should have been made beforehand as to what would be delivered and what would come as a replacement." Also with the Czech Republic and Slovakia no ring exchange agreements could be made so far.

But Merz does not consider the concept to have failed.

No legal basis for reparations

With his trip to the east, Merz was one step ahead of Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) for the second time.

The leader of the opposition had also been there before the Chancellor in the series of politicians' trips by night train to the war zone Ukraine.

As has been heard, Kaczyński addressed him directly as “future Chancellor”.

The desire for more German commitment or even "leadership" in Europe is often heard abroad, according to the delegation, which included the CDU parliamentary group leader Patricia Lips and the foreign politician Knut Abraham.

The Warsaw talks also included the Berlin coalition's efforts, criticized by Poland, to abolish the principle of unanimity in the EU on foreign policy issues.

Merz made it clear

The conversation with Kaczynski is said to have been correct, even polite to friendly - despite openly expressed differences.

The Polish side is thus continuing its practice of politely receiving difficult interlocutors behind closed doors but publicly attacking them - a procedure that is practiced in reverse rather than in other countries.

However, Kaczynski – as was expected from a PiS politician – did address the issue of reparations for the German occupation from 1939 to 1945 in detail.

On September 1, Warsaw wants to present a report on Poland's war damage, which has been announced for about five years and has been drawn up by PiS politicians in parliament.

Merz referred to the German position that there is no currently valid legal basis for reparations.

In another point he met his hosts.

After criticism of the disadvantages faced by the German minority in Poland in mother-tongue classes, Merz said of the situation of Poles in Germany: “We too are late.

We are not fulfilling our obligations under the German-Polish treaty of 1991.”