Speaking on Sunday evening Merz said US President Donald Trump had made it “clear that [his] government is fairly indifferent to Europe’s fate” and that Germany would have to wait to see “whether we will still be able to speak about Nato in its current form” when the alliance meets for its next summit in June.
CDU leader Friedrich Merz has said his “absolute priority” will be to strengthen Europe so as to achieve independence from the US in defence matters as he prepares to embark on coalition negotiations that are expected to last until Easter.
His centre-right CDU/CSU alliance came top of the German election, winning 28.5% of the vote, while outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD) crashed to its worst result since the second world war, gaining just 16.4% of the vote.
Weidel said her party remained open to coalition talks with other parties, and said excluding the AfD was the equivalent to “voter fraud”.
Christian Lindner, the leader of the liberal FDP whose falling out with Scholz triggered the collapse of his coalition government and paved the way for early elections, resigned after his party failed to reach the 5% threshold to re-enter parliament.
