Russian President Vladimir Putin likes to honor well-known contemporaries around the world who he assumes are well-disposed towards his regime and him personally.

WELT AM SONNTAG has located those Germans who have been awarded the exclusive Order of Friendship or the even more prestigious Order of Honor by decree of the Kremlin ruler since his third term as President since spring 2012. During this time, one and a half dozen personalities from politics, business and sport have received this recognition.

But how should one deal with the decoration of Putin’s grace today, after the turn of the century? That’s what we wanted to know from the winners.

Some did not respond to the request, which in turn was a reason for others to deal with the awarding of the order.

A selection of the answers is reproduced here. Among them is a tangible surprise: a chosen one, the most powerful sports official in the world, claims that Putin’s medal never reached him.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Heinrich Weiss: From the then Russian ambassador Vladimir Grinin in the Berlin embassy on May 2, 2013 on the occasion of an embassy reception on this occasion.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Weiss: Some of our long-standing customers and the Russian Industry Association wanted to use this to honor our company’s more than 100-year business relationship with the Russian steel and metal industry and my personal commitment over more than five decades.

WELT AM SONNTAG: What did this order mean to you, on which occasion did you wear it and where did you keep it?

Weiss: As I was able to have many political discussions over the years in addition to the business ones in the sense of strengthening the traditional cultural and friendly relations between our two countries, this official recognition also meant a lot to me.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Weiss: Why should I give it back? It was not given to me by a criminal regime, but in the name of the Russian people. The reasons for this endure.

WELT AM SONNTAG: How did your view of President Putin change on February 24?

Weiss: I am absolutely appalled by the brutal, revisionist and war criminal personality of the President that is now coming to light.

Warnig left questions from this editorial team unanswered. Because he is one of the Germans who have received the rarely awarded order of the highest category, he should not be missing from this list, especially since he is one of Putin’s closest confidants in this country.

Not even Gerhard Schröder received the Order of Honor, the other German who is as close to Putin as Warnig. What connects the latter two is their previous careers as foreign agents for the Stasi and the KGB.

After the fall of the GDR, Warnig began a second life as a manager at Dresdner Bank, for which he built up business in Russia. After his Stasi past was revealed in 2005, he managed the construction of the two pipelines through the Baltic Sea for the Gazprom subsidiaries Nord Stream 1 and 2. Although Warnig has expressed dismay at the war in a statement, he has made no sign of distancing himself from Putin.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

John Neumeier: The order was given to me in a different time: the country had not yet invaded Ukraine, you could fly to Moscow twice a day. We were in St. Petersburg for a guest performance. It was the time of increasing hostility towards homosexuals in Russia. I deliberately included a long excerpt from my ballet “Death in Venice” in the gala programme.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Neumeier: The selection for this medal was certainly related to my work at the three major theaters in Russia, the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg and the Stanislavsky and Bolshoi Theaters in Moscow. Of course I would no longer accept the medal and – if a suitable opportunity arose – gladly return it.

It is undisputed that Thomas Bach is on Vladimir Putin’s ukase of March 22, 2014, with which he was awarded the medal after the Winter Games in Sochi. But did the noble metal even reach the recipient? A spokesman for Bach tells a previously unknown story:

“The IOC is aware of the public announcement in Russia in 2014. It was then that it learned about it from the media. The IOC President never accepted this award and therefore never received it.”

Is it really possible that the “Order of Honor” did not reach Bach? That would be an embarrassment for Putin’s administration, which was apparently unable to sell the award. For a long time, the IOC President (President of the International Olympic Committee) from Germany and the man in the Kremlin courted each other. The relationship has recently cooled, and the IOC revoked Putin’s Olympic medal at the end of February.

Bach has received numerous state honors, including the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise. He received it in September 2021 in Kyiv from President Volodymyr Zelenskyj “for special services to the state and people of Ukraine”.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Michael Harms: I received the medal from President Alexander Shokhin at an event organized by the Russian business association RSPP in Moscow at the end of 2014. There was a general document with a stamp of the presidential administration for the order.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Harms: I received the award in my capacity as Managing Director of AHK Russia for promoting German-Russian economic relations. There is a certain automatism there. My predecessor had already received the order.

WELT AM SONNTAG: What did this order mean to you, on which occasion did you wear it and where did you keep it?

Harms: I never wore the medal because I personally don’t value such awards and awards and medals generally don’t mean much to me. He’s at my house.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Harms: No. I don’t believe in symbolic gestures like that. A demonstrative return would give the award a meaning it does not have. I don’t need the Order to voice my disapproval of current Russian politics. I’ve been doing this since the first day of the war.

WELT AM SONNTAG: How did your view of President Putin change on February 24?

Harms: I am disappointed and appalled by Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. I never would have thought this possible. The Committee on Eastern European Economic Relations and I personally are currently doing a great deal to comprehensively support Ukraine and the Ukrainian economy in this situation.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Erwin Sellering: At the beginning of 2018, I received the order from the then Ambassador Vladimir Grinin, who surprisingly came to Schwerin for a conversation.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Sellering: There was no justification. I suppose because, in addition to good business contacts, I was always concerned with supporting and organizing a friendly coexistence between the people from our federal state and the people in Russia, especially in our partner region, the Leningrad Oblast.

WELT AM SONNTAG: What did this order mean to you, on which occasion did you wear it and where did you keep it?

Sellering: Such honors are generally of little importance to me. I never wore the medal.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Sellering: Yes, a few days after Russian troops invaded Ukraine. I sent the order to the Russian Embassy in Berlin.

WELT AM SONNTAG: How did your view of President Putin change on February 24?

Sellering: Putin as a person has never before played a role in my behavior towards Russia. After the invasion, the board of directors of the German-Russian partnership association (chairman is Sellering, ed.) responded with a public statement that corresponds to my point of view.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Hans Modrow: The award was handed over by the ambassador in the Russian embassy on March 20, 2018, and the award was given on the occasion of my 90th birthday.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Modrow: The order honored my many years of efforts for understanding and reconciliation between the German and Russian people.

WELT AM SONNTAG: What did this order mean to you, on which occasion did you wear it and where did you keep it?

Modrow: The order means a lot to me because I see it as an expression of the high regard the Russian people have for my efforts to promote international understanding and peace in Europe. I never wore it.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Modrow: I see no reason to return this award. This order was not awarded in order to suggest approval of a day-to-day political decision by the awarder.

WELT AM SONNTAG: How did your view of President Putin change on February 24?

Modrow: My judgment of Putin did not change on February 24. Even before that day he was the representative of a capitalist state which – like every head of state – represents the interests of those circles that essentially support this state. In the case of Russia, these are mostly those who are called oligarchs in this country.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Matthias Platzeck: A few days after the start of the war, I returned the medal to the ambassador by post. The reason given was Russia’s unjustifiable war of aggression in Ukraine.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Alexander Rahr: I received the Russian medal for my 60th birthday. The order was handed over to me in the Russian embassy.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Rahr: For my many years of commitment to international understanding. For 20 years I promoted civil society contacts between the two countries in the German Society for Foreign Relations (DGAP) and in the Petersburg Dialogue. And before that I received the Federal Cross of Merit for the same services as a bridge builder after reunification. Incidentally, I have also received honors from Ukraine.

WELT AM SONNTAG: What did this order mean to you, on which occasion did you wear it and where did you keep it?

Rahr: Naturally I was happy about the appreciation of my life’s work, but I didn’t wear the medals.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Rahr: I didn’t return the medal after the war of aggression against Ukraine, but since then I’ve seen my life’s work in building relationships between our peoples crumbling. I didn’t foresee the war. What I and many other convinced people in Germany and Russia sincerely and passionately did for rapprochement and understanding by 2014 and 2022 I cannot call a mistake.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Hans-Joachim Frey: In June 2021 it was announced in the press that I should receive the Order of Friendship. However, the order has not been handed over or handed over to me to this day.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Frey: According to my information, I should get it for my involvement in German-Russian cultural exchange.

WELT AM SONNTAG: What did this order mean to you, on which occasion did you wear it and where did you keep it?

Frey: I have been committed to German-Russian cultural exchange for more than 14 years, have worked in various places of work in Germany, Austria and Russia and try to build cultural bridges between countries with my work.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Frey: See answer 1

WELT AM SONNTAG: How did your view of President Putin change on February 24?

Frey: I have learned my lessons and, as a creative artist, have generally refrained from making public political statements for some time.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Where, from whom, on what occasion and when exactly did you receive the order?

Helmut Hahn: On January 2, 2022, I found out through a press release from the Russian news agency Novosti that the Russian President signed a decree on December 31, 2021, according to which I was awarded the “Order of Friendship”, the successor award to the “Order of Friendship of Nations”. in Soviet times. On April 2, 2022, an employee of the Russian Embassy in Berlin informed me that the Order was ready for collection at the Russian Embassy in Berlin.

WELT AM SONNTAG: For what special services do you think you received the order?

Hahn: I was informed in recognition of my “great contribution to the development of German-Russian cooperation in the field of health care”.

WELT AM SONNTAG: Did you return the order after the Russian attack on Ukraine? If so: Why, how and when was that exactly? Did you take this opportunity to explain the reasons for the return? If you didn’t return the medal, why not?

Hahn: I didn’t want this award and I informed the embassy that the idea of ​​international friendship on which the order is based had been undermined by the current “military special operation” in the Ukraine and I therefore regard the acceptance of the order as the wrong signal.