SEEON (dpa-AFX) - The CSU in the Bundestag has called on the traffic light coalition to supply Ukraine with Leopard I and II main battle tanks in addition to infantry fighting vehicles. The delivery of the Marder infantry fighting vehicles, which has now been decided, is one thing, CSU state group leader Alexander Dobrindt said Friday at the start of a closed-door meeting in the Bavarian monastery of Seeon. "But the second step must also come." He said Germany must also support Ukraine's right to self-defense with Leopard deliveries - and regardless of whether or not allied states do the same.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) would have the chance here to act himself and offer the Leopard, said Dobrindt, who again accused Scholz of hesitancy. "It's always the same pattern: people wait too long - until a point in time when politically they can't do anything else. And only then do you act. I believe that in Europe, German leadership is rightly understood to mean something different." The Leopard I could be supplied by the defense industry from its stocks, the more modern Leopard II by the Bundeswehr from its depots.

Dobrindt also pleaded for Ukrainian soldiers to be trained on both tanks right now. "The sooner, the better," he said.

After a long wait, the German government had decided to also supply Ukraine with Marder infantry fighting vehicles. They are to be handed over to the country attacked by Russia in the first three months of this year. It is about 40 copies, as government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said Friday in Berlin.

Supplying Marder to Ukraine is a "right decision," Professor Carlo Masala of the Bundeswehr University in Munich said at the closed-door meeting. "Ukraine will in all likelihood start again with offensives and counter-offensives in the spring. That's when it's crucial to have speed and protection for your own soldiers. And that's what the Marder provides."

The decision, however, comes late, he said. "In my opinion, the whole thing could have been delivered in the summer. Then Ukraine would be somewhere else today, militarily speaking, than it is at present," Masala said. Germany had thus broken a taboo it had set itself. Now, he said, the discussion is open to decide on the delivery of further weapons systems, if necessary. "We are talking very specifically about battle tanks," but also about old Soviet MiG-29 fighter aircraft still standing with Eastern European allies, Masala elaborated./sk/DP/ngu