Ex-Chancellor in Talk Show: Merkel praises Merz: “With charm and voice”

Ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel praised today’s Prime Minister Friedrich Merz for his foreign policy in the first months of his term. “So as a citizen I think it’s good what Friedrich Merz did there,” she said in the “Spiegel” talk show “top conversation”, which was recorded in Berlin in the evening. “It is relieving, frankly that Germany will again appear in Europe and the world with charm and voice.”

Merkel has criticized Merz several times

The relationship between Merz and Merkel has been considered broken for many years. The ex-chancellor has publicly criticized her successor to the CDU top and in the Chancellery. She described the fact that his CDU/CSU parliamentary group still enforced a migration decision in the Bundestag with the votes of the AfD. And she also sees the rejection of migrants at the German borders.

As a chancellor, Merz started with the foreign policy claim to give Germany a stronger voice again in Europe and in the world. His inaugural trips to Kiev, Paris or Washington and his summit appearances have so far caused a predominantly positive media echo.

Trump-Lob for Merz “not so relevant”

The fact that US President Donald Trump also praised the Chancellor in his speech before the UN General Assembly does not play a major role for Merkel. “The question of how Donald Trump assesses the German Chancellor and his predecessors is not so relevant for me, frankly,” she said. It is now about that Germany and Europe find their own way, she said. “Unfortunately, we will have very fundamental disputes with the current (US) administration or have it.”