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stern magazine exclusive: Henry Kissinger argues against a coup against Putin: "It is likely that a peace agreement will have to be made with Putin" – but the West should not "tolerate" a Russian nuclear threat

HAMBURG, Germany, June 28, 2022, /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/--

Former US-Secretary Henry Kissinger advocated in an interview with stern

magazine for continuing the dialogue with Russa and with President Wladimir

Putin. Kissinger said: "The war will end someday. After the war the

relationship of Ukraine to Russia will have to be redefined. The relationship

of Europe to Russia will also have to be redefined at the end of the war

because Russia will continue to play an important factor in international

relations. But if Russia were to dissolve as a result of the war, the chaos

that would exist in Central Asia and in the Middle East would be another

disturbing element."

Answering the question if peace will only be possible after Putin has been

removed, he said: "It's likely that the agreement will have to be made with

Putin. If Putin were to be overthrown, it would certainly ease the

negotiations. But when all the other objectives are achieved and you continue

the war for the purpose of overthrowing Putin, that would in my opinion not

have public support no matter how unpopular Putin is at the moment."

Kissinger said furthermore: "It is a very fragile situation when two nuclear

powers are contesting over a non-nuclear power's territory. With the respect of

the use of the threat of nuclear weapons by Russia we cannot possibly yield to

that. For two reasons. First, the irony of the historic evolution since World

War 2 is that enormous sums were spent on nuclear weapons, they have been

refined many times, and yet no country has been willing to use them because

they didn't know how to control the consequences. So, if Putin, if Russia

crossed that line, that has to be rebuffed. It can't be tolerated that a

settlement is made under a nuclear threat because it would change the world.

You can find the full interview here: https://ots.de/v85nAa

Interview was conducted by: Gregor Peter Schmitz, Jan Christoph Wiechmann

Contact: Oliver Creutz creutz.oliver@stern.de +49 40 3703 7248 or

fuchs.cornelia@stern.de +49 151 64955043

SOURCE: Gruner+Jahr, STERN