German Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition government was Thursday struggling to overcome divisions on whether to extend or scrap a weapons export embargo against Saudi Arabia. Berlin last October reacted to the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul by declaring a freeze on weapons sales to Saudi Arabia and other countries involved in the Yemen war.
It has since faced protests by EU partners because the ban, originally imposed until March 9, has impacted joint defence projects such as the Eurofighter and Tornado jets. While France and Britain have urged Germany to end the export halt, human rights groups argue strongly that it should stay in place beyond a new deadline on Sunday, March 31.
That view has many backers among the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), junior partners to Merkel's conservative CDU/CSU bloc in the coalition government.
"We oppose defence exports to dictatorships and into active conflict zones," SPD deputy leader Ralf Stegner said on public TV.
Merkel's bloc favours resumed sales, at least of joint European defence projects.
"Another unilateral German stop to defence exports, imposed without coordination with European and Nato partners, would be wrong and dangerous," its economic policy expert Joachim Pfeiffer told the Passauer Neue Presse daily.
This week French ambassador Anne-Marie Descotes criticised Germany's "unpredictable" arms export policy and pointed out that some companies in the sector were marketing products as "German free" in terms of components.
A German security council meeting Wednesday including Merkel failed to resolve the issue, media reports said.
One reported compromise proposal was to give the green light to multinational defence products with a German share of no more than 20 percent.
Stegner urged "a sensible solution", stressing that the SPD too wants Germany to cooperate with other European powers on joint defence projects. Media reported another idea on the table would be for Germany to hold onto six naval patrol vessels and a training ship that had been ordered by Saudi Arabia.