Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, described Germany’s accusations against Moscow regarding the drone incident at the Leipzig/Halle airport as “in essence the start of a real war,” and compared Berlin’s diplomatic actions with the closure of its missions before World War II.

Lavrov also referred to Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s wish for Germany to become the leading military power in Europe and accused Germany of allowing the return of “metastases of Nazism.”