Borders should not be changed by force: German Chancellor

Panaji, Oct 26 (PTI) German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Saturday said borders should not be changed by “war or force”, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine poses the biggest threat to international peace today as “it is about changing borders”.

Inviolability of national borders is the basis for peace, he said, interacting with the students of Birla Institute of Technology And Science (BITS) Pilani at Vasco during a visit to Goa during which he also visited the German Naval ship FGS Baden-Wurttemberg docked at Mormugao Port.

The chancellor, on a three-day visit to India, referred to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war while replying to a question.

“Coming back to the crisis and conflicts that we are seeing, the biggest threat that is today happening to international security and peace is the war for aggression that Russia started against Ukraine.

“This is because of one single aspect of this attack,” he said, adding, “It is about changing borders. And the agreement that we had in the United Nations and in many other regional agreements on peace and security, for instance also for Europe, is that never borders should be changed by war and force, again.”

“This is the basis for peace, if you are a small country,” Scholz said.

The German Chancellor recalled that a Kenyan ambassador to the United Nations once said in the Security Council that the borders of African countries were drawn by officials of colonial powers, and `if we would all try to find the right border and are going to war, we will have hundred years of war in Africa’.

This should not happen, Scholz said, stressing that the borders as they are today should not be threatened, and this is one of the main aspects for global peace and security.

India and Germany are growing together with “innovation, mobility and sustainability”, the chancellor said.

He noted that “a lot of Indians” are now living in Germany, including some 50,000 students, which was a 50 per cent increase over the numbers in 2022.

“I was impressed to know that India now represents the largest group of foreign students at German universities,” he said adding that Germany has a good relationship with India.

Speaking about the need for safe seas for smooth trade, he said the countries must stick to international rules.

“I was mayor of the city of Hamburg which is a port city where the international court of law of seafaring is placed. I am very much linked to this question, that rules coming from these universal agreements should be followed by everyone,” he said.

“It should not be the rule of most powerful, it should be the rule that we develop together, which is the case with the United Nation’s court of the law of seas,” Scholz added.

He discussed these questions with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and “we agreed that it is an important aspect,” he said.

The world’s population will rise to ten billion by 2050 and many newly powerful countries would be coming up then, the chancellor said.

“This is now the time when we develop relations in a way that they are on an equal footing, that everyone is working together, there is no one telling others what to do,” he said.