Ex-German chancellor defeats effort to exclude from party for "links to Moscow"

(RT) ⸻ Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder will remain a member of Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democrats (SPD), despite controversy over his relationship with Moscow. Schroeder forged close ties with Russia during his time in office, and angered the current SPD establishment by meeting with President Vladimir Putin last summer. An SPD arbitration committee in Hannover ruled that Schroeder had violated no party rules, and thus could not be expelled. Schroeder served as chancellor from 1998 to 2005, during which he signed off on the construction of the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. After leaving office, Schroeder worked as a director of Nord Stream AG, the German-Russian consortium responsible for both Nord Stream pipelines, which were destroyed by the US in September. He also served as a director on the board of Russian oil giant Rosneft, a position that he resigned from last May. Schroeder's positions caused friction between the SPD and the SPD, which has abandoned its long-standing aversion to military intervention under Scholz and sent $2.4 billion worth of military aid to Ukraine since Russia launched its military operation last February. Germany's ruling parties stripped Schroeder of his parliamentary privileges in May, a month after he relinquished his honorary citizenship of Hannover before the city could strip him of it. Schroeder insisted afterwards that Russia sought a negotiated solution to the conflict, and that he would keep seeking "opportunities to talk to President Putin" to help make this happen.