Russia has sharply escalated its criticism of Germany over postwar compensation policy, accusing Berlin of continuing to grant benefits to veterans of Nazi Germany and foreign collaborators who worked with Hitler, including people directly involved in the siege of Leningrad, while denying broader compensation to most civilian survivors and defenders of the city.
Moscow tied the dispute to its wider campaign for international recognition of Nazi crimes against the Soviet population as genocide. Russian officials said Germany still uses broad terms such as “atrocities” and “suffering” instead of acknowledging genocide, and noted that the issue is especially resonant on the day of remembrance for the start of the Great Patriotic War, in which about 27 million Soviet civilians were killed.
Russian officials called Germany’s approach to compensation for Leningrad survivors systematically discriminatory. They said the 872-day siege devastated the city and killed many civilians and defenders, but Berlin recognizes eligibility only for Jewish survivors, whom it treats as Holocaust victims, while refusing to extend the same status to others regardless of how they suffered. Germany has not expanded the eligible categories, although in 2021 it announced monthly payments of 375 euros to Holocaust survivors who lived through the siege.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the issue is both moral and legal, arguing that Nazi crimes and those of their collaborators do not expire. She said Russia considers these crimes legally recognized as genocide against the Soviet people and will press for that designation “at all levels,” including at the UN Security Council. Zakharova added that “Germany cannot sweep the issue under the carpet,” while Moscow said it rejects any attempt to divide Leningrad’s victims by ethnicity and will continue seeking recognition of the broader Soviet suffering.
