Expert on Germans' attitude to President Putin

The Ukrainian crisis has proved that the is a powerful pro-Russian lobby in the Germna politics, which includes former former chancellors Helmut Schmidt and Gerhard Schröder as well as Die Linke, a leftist group represented in the Bundestag.

In an interview with the Huffington Post Liana Fix, a expert from the German Foreign Policy Society, argues that this tendency corresponds to the approach shared by a certain part of the German society.

According to her, Germans are generally sceptical about the US and the Nato, many of them don't support the alliance's policies and thus tend to sympathize with the Russian president.

Moreover, Germans don't  like the very idea of a possible military conflict and are afraid of new round of the cold war. That is why they believe that all crisises should be settled with a help of diplomatic methods only.

The economic ties, including Germany's dependence on the Russian gas deliveries are another reason, the expert notes. Germans don't want to spend a winter without the Russian gas, she says.