Germany’s Merkel blasts CDU leader for cooperating with far-right AfD

Angela Merkel, the former German chancellor, has criticised the CDU party’s leader for passing a high-stakes parliamentary motion to tighten immigration with the support of a far-right party.

Friedrich Merz, head of the centre-right CDU, put a non-binding motion to Germany’s parliament on Wednesday to strengthen border controls and accelerate deportations.

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has been used for the first time to pass legislation, helped the measure pass.

In a statement released by her office on Thursday, Merkel – who led the CDU and Germany between 2005 and 2021 – slammed Merz’s decision as “wrong”.

The AfD, an anti-immigrant and eurosceptic party, is polling second behind the CDU ahead of the February 23 national elections.

After the breakdown of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s three-party coalition in November, Merz made a commitment to avoid passing measures with the help of the AfD, Merkel recalled.

For his part, Merz insists that he didn’t want to work with the AfD, and that he didn’t break a political consensus, sometimes referred to as the “firewall”, to shun the far-right party.

He argued that “a correct decision doesn’t turn out improper because the wrong people approve it.”

But Merkel said, “I think it was wrong no longer to feel committed to this proposal and, on 29 January, to enable… a majority with votes from AfD in a vote in the German parliament”.

Migration dominates election campaign

Following a number of attacks linked to suspects with immigrant backgrounds, migration is a hot topic in the German election campaign.

After Merkel resigning in 2021, Merz assumed control of the CDU. He is more socially conservative than his predecessor, and has taken a restrictive stance on migration.

Since Merkel allowed a sizable flow of immigrants into Germany, he claimed last week that the country has had a “misguided asylum and immigration policy” for a decade.