Germany’s chancellor designate, Angela Merkel, on Sunday signalled a new era for the country’s foreign policy, including a ”fresh start” with the United States and looser ties with Paris and Moscow.
Merkel intends to repair relations with Washington after the row between her predecessor, Gerhard Schröder, and George Bush over Iraq, her aides said over the weekend. She also promised a transformation in Germany’s relationship with its two closest allies, Russia and France.
Merkel wants ”more distance” with Moscow and a looser, less exclusive alliance with France’s president, Jacques Chirac, officials from her Christian Democratic party told the magazine Der Spiegel. She also wants to improve relations with the new EU states in eastern Europe, especially Poland, they added.
Merkel’s aides also held out the prospect of Germany playing a ”moderating” role in Europe — able to adjudicate between competing national interests within a vastly expanded EU. ”The transformation will be subtle, but carried out with the full authority of the chancellor,” a senior Merkel official said.
There was no mention of Britain. But Merkel’s apparent determination to draw a line under the Schröder era is likely to delight Downing Street, which is trying to broker a deal over the EU Budget. The issue provoked a furious row in June between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and French President Jacques Chirac.
Schröder, Chirac’s closest ally, criticised Britain’s refusal to compromise on its rebate, and last week dismissed Blair’s attempts to reform the EU as irrelevant. The prime minister had hoped that Merkel would attend last week’s EU summit at Hampton Court. Instead, after Germany’s deadlocked election, Schröder came in her place, ridiculing Blair’s attempts to introduce ”Anglo-Saxon” economics to the rest of Europe.
Leading politicians from Schröder’s Social Democrats on Sunday cast doubt on Merkel’s ability to transform German foreign policy when she takes office next month. Coalition negotiations between Merkel’s party and the SPD are continuing, with Merkel likely to be formally appointed chancellor after a vote in Parliament on November 22.
However, the Social Democrats will hold on to the post of foreign minister. They have nominated Frank-Walter Steinmeier — a lawyer and confidant of Schröder whose command of English is inferior to that of his predecessor, the dazzling Joschka Fischer. Although Merkel would be able to set ”accents” in foreign policy, the ”main thrust” would come from the SPD, the party’s deputy leader, Gernot Erler, said at the weekend.
On Sunday, meanwhile, Schröder admitted that he was considering leaving politics early rather than spending the next four years as a backbencher. He did not intend to hang around like his predecessor Helmut Kohl, he said, who stayed in Parliament after losing power in 1998. – Guardian Unlimited Â