BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - New Defense Minister Boris Pistorius wants to prepare for a possible delivery of German battle tanks to Ukraine. "In order to be best prepared for possible decisions, I instructed my house on Friday to check everything to such an extent that we do not lose unnecessary time in the event of an eventuality," the SPD politician told Bild am Sonntag in response to a question about the upcoming decision. "We are in very close dialogue with our international partners, first and foremost with the United States, on this issue."

Politicians from the Greens and FDP are pressing Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) to deliver battle tanks to Ukraine. The chairwoman of the defense committee in the Bundestag, Strack-Zimmermann, had told Tagesschau24 on Saturday that she assumed the defense ministry knew how many operational Leopard 2 tanks Germany had. "So it's not just a question of which ones are operational, but which ones can be deployed immediately. It's also a question of logistics." Strack-Zimmermann said this should be discussed on Monday between Pistorius, the inspector general of the German Armed Forces and the industry, and then a decision should be made as soon as possible. The Defense Ministry would not comment on this when asked by Deutsche Presse-Agentur.

Pistorius had said on Friday on the sidelines of a Ukraine conference at the U.S. Ramstein Air Base that Germany was preparing for a possible delivery by now reviewing the availability and number of these tanks. A decision on delivery would be made "as soon as possible," he said.

Der Spiegel" reported with reference to an internal paper of the Defense Ministry that there was a detailed list from early summer last year of Leopard models available at the Bundeswehr that could be considered for delivery. According to information from "Der Spiegel," the troops consider 19 of these tanks to be available in case of doubt, because they would only be used in exercises.

Pistorius had taken office on Thursday after Christine Lambrecht resigned as head of department. Strack-Zimmermann said Lambrecht had apparently not wanted a current inventory to avoid the impression that if you count, you want to deliver. This had been reported from "Business Insider" with reference to several sources in the ministry. A spokeswoman for the Ministry of Defense explained in response to a dpa query that they do not comment on reporting as a matter of principle./hrz/DP/jha