The German government spokesman avoided answering the question of whether Chancellor Angela Merkel would attend the annual conference of the Petersburg Dialogue in October
BERLIN (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 28th May, 2021) The German government spokesman avoided answering the question of whether Chancellor Angela Merkel would attend the annual conference of the Petersburg Dialogue in October.
"I can't tell you this today," Steffen Seibert said at a briefing in Berlin when asked the question.
The annual session of the Petersburg Dialogue, which is a Russian-German civil forum, scheduled for October 14-15 in Kaliningrad, will take place only if all organizations participate freely, the German directors of the Petersburg Dialogue said earlier. They also condemned the decision of the Russian state prosecutor's office to ban three German-based NGOs on charges of being a threat to national security and calling their activities on Russia's territory "undesirable".
The three NGOs in question are the Forum of Russian-speaking Europeans, the Center for Liberal Modernity, and the German-Russian Exchange.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said Moscow's decision delivered a serious blow to bilateral relations and urged Russia to reconsider it.
The Forum of Russian-speaking Europeans told Sputnik it did not agree with the decision of the Russian state prosecutor's office and claimed to have never meddled in the political life of Russia.
