Chancellor Angela Merkel’s remarks about the ‘failure of multiculturalism’ in the country suggest a shift in attitude to foreigners.
A European row over France’s repatriation of Roma migrants escalated on Friday, pitting President Nicolas Sarkozy against Germany’s Angela Merkel.
French Economy Minister Christine Lagarde said on Thursday that she did not believe the euro’s survival was in danger.
Germany’s Cabinet has approved the biggest national contribution to a $1-trillion emergency rescue package intended to stabilise the euro.
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/ 9 November 2009
The united Germany remains marred by division 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday.
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/ 28 September 2009
Angela Merkel has won a second term as chancellor, but the politician hailed as the big winner is the leader of the Free Democrats, Guido Westerwelle.
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/ 25 September 2009
Barring a huge election day surprise on Sunday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is expected to win a second term at the helm of Europe’s top economy.
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/ 23 September 2009
German Chancellor Angela Merkel looks on track to win a second term, the last polls released before Sunday’s election indicated.
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/ 14 September 2009
Angela Merkel was on Monday still on track to win re-election in two weeks’ time after her rival failed to land a knock-out blow in a TV debate.
Angela Merkel’s conservatives licked their wounds on Monday after polls raised doubts about their coalition’s chances of winning a looming election.
Italian car giant Fiat on Friday said it could not improve its offer to buy Opel against a rival bid and would not attend key talks on the takeover.
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/ 6 February 2009
Two German catholic groups on Friday appealed to fellow members of the faith to back the pope in the row over a Holocaust-denying bishop.
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/ 14 January 2009
Snared by the global economic slump, the German economy contracted sharply last year, suggesting a disastrous 2009 for Europe’s industrial powerhouse.
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/ 13 January 2009
The costs of a new financial stimulus plan and a slumping economy will cause Germany’s budget deficit to hit a record in 2009, a top lawmaker said.
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/ 12 January 2009
Policymakers facing mounting job losses prepared new measures to ease the pain on Monday.
Stakeholders in the transport of Siberian gas to Europe should form a consortium to manage the pipelines, a leader of German business said on Friday.
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/ 15 October 2008
Giles Morris gives the lowdown on how to network on the internet.
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/ 14 October 2008
Having sabotaged eco-innovations, the motor industry is now demanding billions, writes George Monbiot.
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/ 13 October 2008
Fifteen European leaders closed in Sunday on a joint strategy to end the haemorrhaging of market confidence.
European leaders warned Russia on Sunday to withdraw its forces rapidly from Georgia or face unspecified consequences.
What began as a skirmish has become a tragedy of global importance.
The risk of a new era of East-West confrontation triggered by Russia’s invasion of Georgia heightened on Friday.
Plans to include an Adolf Hitler figure in the new Berlin branch of Madame Tussauds wax museum are being condemned by critics, who say displaying the dictator is tasteless and could attract neo-Nazis. Madame Tussauds argues Hitler is part of German history and deserves a place in the exhibition near the Brandenburg Gate.
The Dalai Lama accused China of ”suppression” and demanded autonomy for Tibet as he arrived Thursday in Germany to start a Western tour ahead of the Beijing Olympics. ”The Chinese political authorities’ reaction, as before, was suppression. So it is very sad,” he said of China’s military crackdown.
The German government on Monday brushed off a verbal attack from Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in which the leftist leader said Chancellor Angela Merkel was a political descendant of Adolf Hitler and German fascism. Merkel sets off for her first trip to Latin America on Tuesday.
While the European Union has wanted a conclusion to its economic partnership agreements (EPAs) as soon as possible, the Malawian government has been staving off a deal. The deadline for EPAs at the end of last year passed without Malawi signing — in contrast to other African states.
African National Congress president Jacob Zuma and Britain made a united call on Wednesday for an end to the election stalemate in Zimbabwe, stepping up pressure on President Robert Mugabe to release results. Zuma, who has become the most outspoken African leader on Zimbabwe, held talks in London with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
The view from Hans-Joachim Sommer’s office window is as wintry as you can get on a spring morning: a few stunted fir trees, a wire fence and the blank grey of a Baltic sky. His conversation is as bleak. ”The teenagers here are all highly criminal,” said the 47-year-old former sports teacher. ”Their problems are very complex.”
United States President George Bush set the stage for a clash at his last Nato summit on Wednesday by pressing reluctant West European allies to set former Soviet republics Georgia and Ukraine on a path to membership. He also urged allies to follow the example of France and host nation Romania in providing extra troops for Nato’s battle against Islamist insurgents in Afghanistan.
You can write much of the script for London 2012 already: the tube strikes, the cost over-runs, the security computers that won’t work and the Kazakh weightlifters lost in Terminal Five. But the real problem for the Olympic games we thought we wanted to host is beginning to emerge from the smog over Beijing.
The prospect of France returning to Nato’s military command after more than four decades of estrangement is tilting the balance of transatlantic relations. The United States is courting France as a new partner in leadership, overshadowing Britain and Germany, diplomats and analysts say, even though President Nicolas Sarkozy is likely to skirt the reintegration issue at this week’s Bucharest summit.
The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, on Friday became the first world leader to decide not to attend the Olympics in Beijing. As pressure built for concerted Western protests to China over the crackdown in Tibet, European Union leaders prepared to discuss the crisis for the first time on Saturday, amid a rift over whether to boycott the Olympics.