Pro-EU stance doesn’t count: German minister ripped apart by media for RT interview

Leading German media, along with some politicians, attacked Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection Katarina Barley for her interview with RT… despite the fact that she expressed strong pro-EU viewpoints.

Barley wasn’t attacked for anything she said. Instead, her ‘offense,’ according to leading German papers, was the mere fact that the “unsuspecting” minister gave a seven-minute interview to RT Deutsch earlier this week. Barley was “negligent” in talking to the channel and treating it “as if it was a product of normal journalism,” Die Welt fumed.

The paper added that just by speaking to RT, Barley was “playing the game of an authoritarian regime” in Moscow. That was written despite the fact that the minister had expressed absolutely pro-EU opinions during the very same interview, which was aired unedited.

Similar frustration was vented on the pages of Der Spiegel, Handelsblatt, Der Tagesspiegel and other publications.

Some politicians also joined the attempts to shame Barley. “Did you confuse the microphone? That doesn’t fit into a pro-European party,” Tobias Hans, the top official in Saarland, wrote on Twitter. Disgruntled reporters quickly started posting pictures of other prominent German politicians who preferred to ignore the bashing of RT and spoke to the channel just like they would to any other media.

What the critics didn’t do is provide any specific soundbites from Katarina Barley that would sound ‘anti-European.’ On the contrary, when speaking to RT, she advocated for a stronger EU and blasted countries that “seek to weaken it” by pursuing their “selfish national interests.”

She further praised French President Emmanuel Macron, who she said “emphasizes the importance of the European Union.”

Only together can we play in a global orchestra. Alone any country, even the largest and the most powerful on the EU scale, will lose its importance of the world stage.

Barley voiced support for more integration among member states.

“We must further develop our economic union so it becomes a Europe for its citizens,” she told RT.

The minister said that Berlin maintains “close ties with Russia” and called Moscow “our partner.” However, she also stressed that Germany’s partnership with Moscow “doesn’t mean we won’t take issue with certain things.”

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