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Doesn't celebrate every birthday: Kevin Kühnert at the celebration event for the Bremen SPD
Photo: Sina Schuldt/dpa
SPD General Secretary Kevin Kühnert used an anniversary celebration of the Bremen SPD to take a swipe at the controversial former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, who is celebrating his birthday on Sunday. In the past few days he had made a mistake, said Kühnert at the ceremony in the evening in the Hanseatic city. He said that he would be at a Social Democratic birthday party this week. The SPD general secretary said that people then looked at him “always petrified and dumbfounded.” It was only then that he remembered that, in addition to the Bremen SPD, it was also Schröder's birthday this week.
The former Federal Chancellor turns 80 this Sunday. A celebration organized by his wife Soyeon Schröder-Kim is scheduled to take place in Berlin at the end of the month. There is an ice age between Schröder and the SPD leadership. The party leadership excludes Schröder because of his connections to Russia and especially to Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin, from whom he has not broken away despite the war of aggression against Ukraine. Schröder, in turn, recently sharply criticized the current party leadership.
Just last week, Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) suggested that Schröder resign from the party because of his closeness to Putin. Lauterbach wrote on the platform »Unfortunately we have to be ashamed of him today. This no longer has anything to do with the SPD. As a 'friend' of Putin, he should simply resign from us," Lauterbach continued.
Not surprisingly, Kühnert made it clear at the celebration of the 160th anniversary of the Bremen SPD that he would not be coming to Schröder's birthday. "I don't think I got an invitation either," he said. The SPD general secretary recently made it clear on the RTL and n-tv program “ Frühstart ” that he would not wish Schröder a happy birthday. "Gerhard Schröder has not been able to find clear words about Vladimir Putin's war of aggression, which violates international law, for more than two years," Kühnert criticized there. This is “more than a difference of opinion.”
czl/dpa