German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock announced on Tuesday that her scheduled week-long visit to the Indo-Pacific region had to be canceled due to persistent mechanical problems with her government aircraft.
“We have tried everything: unfortunately it is logistically impossible to continue my Indo-Pacific trip without the defective plane. This is more than annoying,” said Baerbock on X, formerly known as Twitter.

On Monday, the plane had attempted to make the journey from Abu Dhabi twice but was forced to return for safety reasons due to a technical malfunction with the wing flaps, a foreign ministry spokesperson said on X.

Baerbock had been due to travel to Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji.

Last year, Baerbock also had to cancel a trip to meet with her British counterpart, James Cleverly, due to poor weather.

In 2018, former Chancellor Angela Merkel missed the opening of the G20 summit in Argentina over a “serious malfunction” that forced her government plane to make an unscheduled landing.