Activists protest Germany’s plan to purchase F-35 fighter jets

BERLIN (AA) - A group of activists gathered outside the German parliament on Wednesday to protest the government’s plan to purchase F-35 fighter jets.

The activists put on masks depicting Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Cabinet ministers, carried banners protesting the €10 billion ($10.6 billion) deal, and symbolically dumped a model of an F-35 fighter jet into a garbage bin.

“That's a new plane that they're buying from the US, from Lockheed Martin, and that's going to be used for delivering nuclear weapons should it come to that,” said Xanthe Hall from the German affiliate of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.

“That's important for us that people understand what's going on here. And of course, we want to reach the people inside the parliament (the Bundestag) that they understand there are lots of us out here that really don't want this nuclear bomber, and we think these billions of euros could be used on something better,” she told Anadolu Agency.

Greenpeace activists also held a protest outside the parliament, holding banners that warned of a nuclear escalation, and called on lawmakers not to support the controversial purchase of F-35 fighter jets.

“Germany doesn’t have nuclear bombs, but the US has nuclear bombs here,” an activist from the group said, referring to the bombs at American military bases in Germany.

He pointed out that the F-35 fighter jets purchased by Germany would carry nuclear bombs in line with NATO's nuclear sharing arrangement.

“Nuclear bombs are always weapons of mass destruction … We ask the parliamentarians not to buy these bombers,” he added.