Diplomacy: Criticism of UN post for Baerbock – Heusgen: “Explan model”

The outgoing federal government has defended the nomination of Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) against sharp criticism for the chair of the UN General Assembly. Baerbock is “highly qualified for this job” and highly recognized, said government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit in Berlin. Therefore, the cabinet “agreed to nominate Ms. Baerbock” even in agreement with the future potential federal government.

The former chairman of the Munich Security Conference, Christoph Heusgen, had sharply criticized Baerbock’s planned nomination for the chair of the UN General Assembly. “It is outrageous to replace the best and most internationally experienced German diplomat with a discontinued model,” Heusgen told the Tagesspiegel. The “Rheinische Post” he said that the nomination gave a bad light on German foreign policy.

The top German top diplomat Helga Schmid was originally intended for the office. Now the position is to be politically occupied and Baerbock is to be named as a German candidate for the 2025/26 session period. According to the German press agency, a corresponding cabinet decision in the circulation procedure is launched.

Heusgen: Baerbock is “polarizing politician”

Heusgen commented on Baerbock’s move to New York with the remark “Action Abendrot” and emphasized Schmid’s achievements. “Helga Schmid was an office manager of Joschka Fischer, Secretary General of the European Foreign Service, who negotiated the Iranian nuclear agreement and then general secretary of the OSCE, who protected her from falling apart,” said the former diplomat in the “Tagesspiegel”. “Is that feminist foreign policy?”

In the “Rheinische Post” he described Baerbock as “polarizing politician who has profiled herself more through pithy press explanations than through stubborn caretry work”.

A spokesman for the Federal Foreign Office, on the other hand, said in Berlin that the candidacy at a high political level of Germany’s commitment to the United Nations and the willingness to take special responsibility for this multilateral system in difficult times.

The spokesman for the Foreign Ministry emphasized that Schmid was a highly qualified and respected diplomat. As deputy President of the Board of Trustees of the Munich Security Conference, she should, together with his President Wolfgang Ischinger, initially lead the operational business-until the future conference chair, ex-Nato general secretary Jens Stoltenberg, can take up his position. Schmid has also headed a specialist forum of the security conference on the Middle East (“Middle East Consultation Group”) since December 2024.

Baerbock is scheduled to start post in September

Baerbock is to be elected in June and will take up their one -year term in September. According to internal agreements, your choice is a matter of form at the United Nations.

The outgoing Secretary of State had announced that she would not take a leadership role in the future Greens parliamentary group for personal reasons. She had previously been traded as a new co-faction leader. “After years on highspeed” she wanted to think for a few days “what this moment means for my family and me,” wrote the mother of two girls at the time to the Greens parliamentary group and her Greens-Landesverband Brandenburg.

Baerbock had led her party to the Bundestag election campaign as the first candidate for chancellor in 2021. In November, Baerbock and her husband Daniel Holefleisch announced their separation.