OREANDA-NEWS. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that it is necessary to continue dialogue with Russia. According to her, the policy towards Moscow should not change because of the situation with the opposition leader Aleksey Navalny.

Navalny has been in a coma since August 20. On August 22 he was transferred from the Omsk hospital to the Berlin clinic in the status of “the chancellor’s guest.” Western leaders demand from the Russian authorities a transparent investigation into the possible poisoning of the oppositionist.

“I don’t think that we should change it (Germany’s policy towards Russia. – Ed.),” Merkel said at the annual summer press conference. She believes that the conflicts of recent years due to the situation with Ukraine, sanctions and spy scandals “again and again strain German–Russian and European–Russian relations,” but these relations must be preserved. According to Merkel, there are many international issues in the solution of which Russia is “a geostrategic player with which it is necessary to remain in negotiations.” The Chancellor named the Syrian and Libyan conflicts as examples. “The goal, as before, is to have good relations with Russia,” Merkel concluded.