German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Europe may need to rethink its competition rules if it wants to create companies that can play a significant role on the global stage.

The world’s fourth-largest economy has set 2038 as the deadline for reaching zero coal, not a moment too soon, say Johan Rockström and Owen Gaffney.

Mr Abe and Mrs Merkel, who lead the third and fourth largest economies in the world, represent internationally minded governments keen on supporting free trade and co-operation.

For the first time since 2000, Angela Merkel’s name will no longer appear on the ballot for the German electorate, writes Philip Hartley.

Forget Brexit, the real battle is taking place within every EU country. It is a battle between progressives and authoritarians, writes Yanis Varoufakis

It's a case of mistaken identity on a global stage.

German chancellor Angela Merkel may not be a perfect political leader — does such a paradigm exist?— but she is the most powerful, the most important woman in Europe.

That European Union leaders managed to reach any agreement on immigration must be welcomed — even if that agreement will be tested to destruction.

The leaders of Germany and France have agreed to create a eurozone budget they hope will boost investment and provide a safety mechanism for the 19 nations using the euro currency, and also to seek a European solution to migration issues.

Peter Apps says in an increasingly chaotic world the G7 states need to come together and remind the world of what they believe in, and why they think it matters.

The EU's trade chief has said German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Emmanuel Macron will press US leader Donald Trump this week to exempt the 28-member bloc permanently from US steel and aluminium tariffs.

Angela Merkel is nothing if not resolute.

Germany's parliament has elected Angela Merkel for her fourth term as chancellor, putting an end to nearly six months of political drift in Europe's biggest economy.

The third grand coalition in Merkel’s long chancellorship is a marriage of convenience: loveless, largely unloved, and devoid of any overarching vision, writes Helmut K Anheier.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has welcomed the coalition deal and says "it's important that we start quickly with our work".

Germany's Social Democratic Party has voted in favour of joining a coalition with Angela Merkel's conservative bloc, clearing the last major hurdle to the formation of a new government and a fourth term for the German chancellor.

German chancellor Angela Merkel's party has voted in favour of a deal to form a new coalition government with the centre-left Social Democrats.

The age-old assumption that power is an aphrodisiac may not be as secure as it was before Rose McGowan and Ashley Judd, last October, brought Hollywood demagogue Harvey Weinstein’s decades of sexual predation to a shuddering end.

German chancellor Angela Merkel has finally reached a deal to form a new coalition government.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives and Germany's main centre-left party have reached an agreement to form a new coalition government after a final negotiating session that dragged on for 24 hours.

The prospective partners in Germany's new government have resumed their push to nail down a coalition deal.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives and the centre-left Social Democrats have embarked on a final push for an agreement on a new German government, though negotiators appeared likely to need one more day.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is meeting with the leaders of smaller parties for the start of formal talks on forming a new governing coalition.

US officials have hailed America’s commitment to free and fair trade despite possible retaliation by China over new US import tariffs.

Supporters and opponents of a new alliance with Chancellor Angela Merkel are making their case to members of Germany’s main centre-left party, who will decide this weekend whether to negotiate a new governing coalition.

At a moment when faith in politics, especially international politics, to champion liberal, uplifting, human-rights values is at a low ebb, it is reassuring that Angela Merkel seems close to securing a fourth term as Germany’s chancellor.

The Social Democrats insisted after a disastrous election result in September that they would go into opposition, but reluctantly agreed to reconsider after Mrs Merkel’s coalition talks with two smaller parties collapsed.

Members of a rising nationalist party in Germany have elected their leadership at a convention in the city of Hannover that was overshadowed by protests.

Germany's president is to meet with party leaders after talks to form a new government between Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative bloc the left-leaning Greens and pro-business Free Democrats broke down earlier this week.

At a moment when the liberal values that have done so much to advance Western societies over the last 75 years are threatened on so many fronts the difficulties facing chancellor Angela Merkel have implications far beyond German or European borders.

German chancellor Angela Merkel has said she is "very sceptical" about the idea of running a minority government and a new election would be a better option if it is not possible to form a coalition.

Germany faced an uncertain political future after the collapse of weeks of talks on forming a new government, with Chancellor Angela Merkel set to consult the country's president and the possibility of new elections looming.

Chancellor Angela Merkel is widely expected to win a fourth term in office as Germans go to the polls.

DESPITE the sobering lessons inflicted on crystal ball gazers by Brexit, the elevation of President Trump and humiliation of Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May in last June’s

German Chancellor Angela Merkel says that while a lot has been done to address the causes of mass migration and to slow the flow of refugees to Europe, there is still a lot more to do.

It’s response to Turkey’s jailing of a German human rights activist was to discourage tourists from going there and firms from investing there, says Mark Leonard

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has stood by her suggestion that Europe can no longer rely entirely on the US and declared that Germany and China can work together to help calm the world's problems.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's party has won a state election in one of their centre-left rivals' traditional heartlands.

Not for the first time, Ireland looks like it will be centre-stage at this weekend’s meeting of European leaders in Brussels, writes Political Editor Daniel McConnell.

German chancellor Angela Merkel has spoken of the need to protect Ireland in the aftermath of Brexit as one of a “multitude of special interests”.

The Taoiseach will hold high level talks with the German Chancellor in Berlin today.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative party has easily won an election in Germany's western Saarland state.

Shakespeare may say that the apparel oft proclaims the man, but plenty of shame has been brought on our parliament and our country by people ‘appropriately’ dressed for the Dáil, writes Clodagh Finn.

Angela Merkel has underlined Germany's rejection of a claim by US president Donald Trump that her country owes Nato large sums for underspending on defence.