(Seizure; 03-03; p.2)

The President of the USA, George W Bush let his former threats carry out and American as well as British armed forces attacked the sovereign state Iraq.

German politics

Since Germany behaves as a neutral power in this war, her foreign policy can be focussed on traditional activities of diplomacy, development and non-warwaging security politics.
Accordingly, within this framework moves almost every MP; beyond that are arguably only some statements of Angela Merkel, the leader of the main opposition party in parliament, the Christian Democrats.

A benevolent reading of this behaviour - after a months-long period of avoiding a clear position eventually the justification of the American-British assaults - would be that so a window for communication with the aggressors should have been held open.
Against that could be stated that therefore a willingness on the attacker's side was necessary and that there is still dialogue and co-operation on many issues in the already mentioned non-warwaging policy fields.

To the latter, one may point to the ongoing co-operation in Afghanistan or in terror prevention. Moreover, it would be an insult to American businessmen to assume they calculated not economically by ordering goods or services but were following a crude nationalism.

The Minister for Development, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, already has mentioned that the German government funds humanitarian help as among others the Secretary General of the United Nations has demanded. But she as well drew attention to the question of reparations: aggressors are obliged to compensate for the damage caused by them.
It should be mentioned that apart from this, occupying powers have to guarantee food and water supply as well as medical care for the non-combatting population: the American and British are fulfilling this obligation in as much as may be observed from outside.

For the time being, one cannot make out any public diplomatic activity. But one can assume that the employees of the Foreign Office are seeking for all-win procedures and solutions on many levels and with a variety of partners. If at all Germany is isolated in this respect - some opposition MPs uttered that opinion - remains to be seen.
(read on here)