Merkel says losing political clout before stepping down

BERLIN - Angela Merkel, who ran Germany for sixteen years, said that her diminished political power in the run up to her retirement prevented her from setting up diplomatic talks aimed at dissuading President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia from launching Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February.

In an interview published on Thursday, Ms. Merkel said that she and French President Emmanuel Macron had tried to set up talks between European Union leaders and Russian President Putin in the summer of 2021, but failed in an attempt to escalate Russia-Ukraine tensions. At that point, Ms. Merkel had already announced her plans to retire.

She said she no longer had the strength to assert myself because everyone knew she would be gone in the fall.

She said she was losing political clout before stepping down when dealing directly with Putin. Ms. Merkel noted that Putin would not meet with her alone, as he had done in the past, instead choosing to include his foreign secretary, instead of referring to her last state visit to Moscow in August of 2021.