Germany news: Merz faces conservative youth wing in Bonn
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Friedrich Merz, who has struggled for support within his party, on Saturday meets with the CDU/CSU's 90,000-strong Young Union. In Schleswig-Holstein, 3,000 people are expected at an AfD youth rally. DW has more.
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German Chancellor Friedrich Merz addresses conservative CDU/CSU national youth-wing conference The increasingly unpopular leader's approval ratings have been in free fall of late Germany's development minister asks that debt borrowing rules be eased to allow further critical Ukraine funding Here is a roundup of the main news from and about Germany on Saturday, October 17: Tired of missing our real-time updates?
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Berlin's Left Party, the Greens and the Social Democrats (SPD) revealed details of what they hope will be their governing policy, should the coalition be approved by their parties' members.
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Among the policies, the possible left-wing Berlin state government could bring around 160,000 apartments under public ownership. The Left's Elif Eralp, who is seeking to become leader of Berlin, said the compromise would affect five companies, including Germany's largest property company, Vonovia. It all comes as voters made unaffordable housing a central issue, one that The Left campaigned on, as rent costs in Berlin have spiraled in recent years and public apartments have been in short supply.
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Eralp said the three parties also agreed on a "very ambitious new building program" for public housing, where they hope to get 100,000 planning permissions by 2031, which will then lead to 100,000 new affordable flats.
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The coalition hopefuls would also work to implement a rent cap for publicly owned apartments.
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Volker Beck, the president of the German-Israeli Society, sharply criticized the prospect of a Left/Green/SPD coalition in Berlin, labeling the Left "a bunch of anti-Zionists."
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Beck leveled his criticism in an interview with German national broadcaster Deutschlandfunk (DLF).
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The interview will be broadcast Sunday but a manuscript has been made available in which Beck tells DLF that anti-Zionism forms the identity of some in Berlin's Left Party, adding "for them, anti-Zionism is their world view, their passion."
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"It forms their identity and it is extremely dangerous for society," he said.
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Although Beck vouched for Left Party top candidate Elif Eralp's integrity, saying, "she's riding an anti-Zionist wave but she doesn't control it," he said, "she's overwhelmed with the situation."
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Finally, Beck blasted an antisemitism statement released by the Left, Greens and SPD this week to quell fears as, "unclear," reminding Greens and SPD that Berlin is "now the most radical state chapter the Left Party has."
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The leaders of Berlin's Left, Green and Social Democratic parties wrapped up negotiations for a potential coalition on Saturday, four weeks after state and municipal elections in which the Left was the big winner, taking 25.7% of the vote.
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On Saturday, party leaders informed Germany's DPA press agency that negotiations, which began in earnest on October 8, had been completed and that agreement had been reached on putting the prospect of a coalition up for vote in their respective parties.
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The party votes are scheduled to begin with the Greens on Monday.
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The SPD has not announced a date and the Left will vote on October 31.
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Should the party bases agree to the proposal, the new coalition government could begin work in early November.
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Party leaders scheduled a group press conference outlining the results of negotiations for Saturday afternoon.
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Talks between the three broke down early this week in a fight over accusations of antisemitism among the ranks of the Left Party. The Greens and SPD demanded a clear commitment to sanctions against such transgressions before resuming talks.
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To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video This week's INSA "Sonntagstrend" poll, commissioned by the tabloid Bild, showed a one percentage point drop for both the far-right AfD and the conservative CDU/CSU, and one percentage point gains for the Left Party and the left-wing populist BSW.
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The AfD remains the most popular party in nationwide polling, with 29% favorability.
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Chancellor Friedrich Merz's CDU/CSU is polling second at 18%. The Greens remained steady at 14%, as did the junior coalition partner SPD at 13%.
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The Left, which recently won Berlin's mayoral race but has struggled with its handling of questions of antisemitism, bettered its favorability to 11%; and BSW, which has thrown in its lot with the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt, picked up a point to 4%.
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The liberal FDP rounded out the field unchanged at 4%, while support for other parties amounted to 7%.
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INSA founder and CEO Hermann Binkert said the results of the poll trace a dramatic slide by the country's biggest establishment parties the CDU/CSU and the SPD, noting that their combined 31% meant they had lost "nearly a third of their voters" since the last parliamentary election in 2025.
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INSA, which placed the margin of error at plus/minus 2.9 percentage points, conducted its survey among 1,206 registered voters between October 12 and 16.
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To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video German Development Minister Reem Alabali Radovan has called for a debt-spending exemption for her ministry in order to keep up aid to Ukraine amid deep budget cuts.
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Speaking to Reuters news agency on the sidelines of annual International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank meetings in Bangkok, Thailand, Alabali Radovan said much of Germany's civilian spending for Ukraine comes from her ministry's budget.
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About €330 million ($371 million) in Ukraine funding will come out of her ministry's budget this year, down from €670 million in 2022, and €750 million in 2023.
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In asking for relaxation of Germany's constitutionally anchored debt brake, which limits government borrowing, Alabali Radovan underscored the gravity of the situation: "Russian attacks are more severe than ever, leading to more deaths, more destruction, more suffering.
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But as budget cuts for development assistance continue, we simply will not be able to maintain our support for Ukraine."
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"At this point," she added, "it is not a political decision, we just face massive cuts and it will no longer be possible."
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Alabali Radovan's plan has support from Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul but faces broad pushback from parliamentarians opposed to further borrowing exemptions.
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Alabali Radovan told Reuters that she supports German Chancellor Friedrich Merz's call for other countries to increase Ukraine aid, saying, "We are the strongest supporters, and I believe others can and should contribute more."
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Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Saturday acknowledged that his administration's reform plans "shake up the country, shake up our party," but insisted that they are the only choice for the CDU going forward.
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Speaking of his plan for a fundamental overhaul of Germany's retirement, nursing care and health insurance systems, Merz said: "If we can't show that we've gotten our economy growing sustainably again before the next parliamentary election, that we've sustainably reformed and future-proofed our welfare system by the next parliamentary election, we won't stand a chance in the next parliamentary election." Merz insisted that his Cabinet should sign off on the reforms by the end of the year.
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Among these is a controversial reform that would raise Germany's retirement age.
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Social Democrat (SPD) coalition partners in the federal government are against the move, as are three CDU state premiers in eastern Germany.
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Chancellor Friedrich Merz was in Bonn Saturday to address an annual national meeting of his Christian Democratic and Christian Social Unions' (CDU/CSU) youth wing, the Young Union (Junge Union/JU).
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Things were testy the last time Merz addressed the 90,000-member group — when they fought over pension policy— and he will now face them with dwindling approval numbers and growing dissatisfaction over the way he has led Germany and his party.
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Merz will greet a youth wing that is self-confident as he himself reels from disastrous election results in recent state and municipal elections.
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On Friday, the JU overwhelmingly re-elected Johannes Winkel as their chairman, with the CDU federal parliamentarian taking 94.3% of the vote.
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"Our generation still has big plans," said Winkel as he spoke to JU attendees, "and we will be the ones who successfully continue to write the history of the CDU and CSU as a people's party."
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On Friday, North Rhine-Westphalia State Premier Hendrik Wüst, a rising star within the party, addressed attendees.
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On Sunday, Bavarian State Premier Markus Söder will take the stage.
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Both represent potential replacements for Merz.
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Despite the number of prominent party leaders addressing the JU amid talk of Merz's possible political demise, Johannes Winkel vowed: "We're not some applause meter.
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This isn't a casting show for the chancellorship."
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Guten Morgen from the DW news team in gray and blustery Bonn, where, just across the street, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is addressing the Junge Union (JU) youth wing of his CDU and its Bavarian sister party CSU at an annual national conference.
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Last time Merz spoke to the group, things got confrontational over pension policy. The chancellor will have a number of thorny issues to navigate this time around, not least whether the party thinks it can survive under his leadership. As Germany struggles with budget cuts, the country's development minister asked for a debt spending exemption to cover shortfalls in critical funding assistance for Ukraine.
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Reem Alabali Radovan warned that Ukraine is suffering more death and destruction than ever but "as budget cuts for development assistance continue, we simply will not be able to maintain our support." In the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein, "Generation Deutschland," the youth wing of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), is holding a rally under the motto: "Secure the Future — Safeguard Identity."
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A "Rally for Democracy" counterdemonstration will also take place.
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Police say they expect roughly 3,000 participants in all. Stay tuned for the latest on these angles and plenty more from Germany this weekend.
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