A man had to shell out €4,500 (nearly $5,100) for a bizarre reason—hugging the German Chancellor Olaf Scholz—after he was fined by a court, even as he tried to reason that he was just following the lead of other people in giving an affectionate farewell to the leader.

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The Frankfurt District Court on Tuesday issued a €4,500 (nearly $5,100) fine to the man, who was drug-addled when he mistakenly slipped into the security convoy of Chancellor Olaf Scholz and hugged the politician on an airport runway, said a DW report.

The 50-year-old, who was handed the penalty for driving under the influence of narcotics and trespassing, said he had been partying for two days and had only joined the convoy by mistake.

The man said he had repeatedly consumed cocaine and hadn’t slept when he was driving on a public highway. He claimed to have joined the chancellor’s convoy by mistake before entering the grounds of Frankfurt Airport as part of the motorcade.

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When the convoy stopped, he left his car and approached Scholz as he was about to board the plane. He then shook the politician’s hand and embraced him before being detained by police.

He also explained through his lawyer that he had only been following the lead of other people in giving the chancellor such an affectionate farewell.

In the courtroom, he also expressed remorse and promised to improve his behaviour, while claiming to have landed in the situation by mistake and said it was a bittersweet experience. The defendant was found only partially responsible for the crime.

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The May 2023 incident happened as Scholz was returning to Berlin after a 25th anniversary celebration for the Frankfurt-based European Central Bank.

Scholz’s spokesperson Wolfgang Büchner had told reporters then that the German leader “didn’t feel threatened at any point”. However, the curious case did spark a debate about the chancellor’s safety.

Scholz’s time as chancellor is getting over soon. The Bundestag, Germany’s lower house of parliament, is set to meet on May 6 to elect Friedrich Merz as the country’s next leader, if the parties in his proposed government approve a coalition deal reached last week.

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