Dozens of German businessmen and government leaders have been awarded Russian state awards by Russian dictator Vladimir Putin over the past 10 years. Die Welt writes about it.

As the newspaper notes, some German officials now deny that they accepted such awards or refuse them, in particular, after the start of the war in Ukraine.. However, there are those who, on the contrary, do not want to return the award, and, obviously, value it..

So, according to the investigation, since the beginning of his third presidential term in the spring of 2012, Putin has awarded the Order of Honor of the highest degree to three Germans.. One of them, International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach, now denies receiving such an award..

Denies receiving Russian awards and the head of the Semperopernball (Semper Opera Ball - the largest classical entertainment event in the German-speaking world, which has become one of the most important European balls) Hans-Joachim Frey. According to him, the medal "

At the same time, this award found Nord Stream 2 Managing Director Matthias Warnig and entrepreneur Heinrich Weiss, whose industrial group SMS has been operating in Russia for over 100 years..

During this time, Putin also awarded the Order of Friendship. Some of the "

Among them is former prime minister and SPD leader Matthias Platzeck, who has repeatedly attracted attention because of his closeness to the Kremlin.. He received the award personally from Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in 2018.. Platzeck now says he returned the award in the mail a few days after the start of the war.. He called the reason for the unjustified aggressive war of Russia in Ukraine..

Other " Among them are Michael Harms, managing director of the Committee for Eastern European Economic Relations, and Hans Modrow, the last head of the government of the GDR from the SED party..

Other laureates, such as businessman Martin Herrenknecht and former president of the German War Graves Commission Reinhard Fuhrer, did not respond to the publication's request..

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Recall that earlier the German edition of Welt and the British edition of The Times published investigations into how the supposedly based in Germany environmental foundation only formally fought climate change.. In fact, this fund was financed by the Russian state company Gazprom, and it was the interests of this company that the fund lobbied for at the federal and pan-European levels..

The Times directly accused the Prime Minister of the federal state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Manuela Schwesig, on whose territory the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline begins, of "

Schwesig has also been accused of creating the aforementioned environmental fund, which was secretly designed to lobby for the Russian-backed gas pipeline, deflect criticism and circumvent US sanctions..

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During the period described by these publications, Angela Merkel developed political activity in support of the Russian gas pipeline.

Despite Ukraine's desperate attempts to draw attention to the danger of this project, it was Merkel who was the driving force behind the promotion of this project in the international arena.. She also repeatedly publicly contacted on this issue with Putin personally..

Moreover, it turned out that under Merkel, German refineries were actually "

To date, the Bundestag is already claiming that Germany's dependence on Russia was deliberately shaped by Chancellors Schroeder and Merkel over the past 16 to 20 years..