The Latest Breaking News from Christian Lindner

Christian Democrats came first. But the far right and the left were the biggest gainers.

In today’s newsletter: The far-right AfD may have come second, but at 20% they have been held off by the performance of mainstream parties, with the CDU leader Friedrich Merz on course to be the new chancellor

German politicians made a final scramble for votes Saturday on the eve of key elections in which conservatives hope to win despite the dramatic rise of the far right targeting a record score.

Friedrich Merz set to become new chancellor after provisional results show his conservatives won

This mechanism, which has been blamed for a lack of investment, has emerged as an important election issue.

On Sunday, Germans will vote in an election that could shape both their country’s future and that of the European Union. While the hard-right AfD gains support, centrist and left-leaning parties struggle to tackle key issues such as immigration, inflation, and whether to back US President Donald Trump’s efforts to…

German citizens will take to the polls on February 23 for a snap general election.

When Germans vote on Sunday, conservative Friedrich Merz is the strong favourite to become the next chancellor after a bitterly fought campaign roiled by the rise of the AfD, a far-right party vocally backed by Team Trump.

Development of a joint defence shield would be politically explosive for Keir Starmer. But it’s an idea whose time has come, says the Observer’s foreign affairs commentator Simon Tisdall