When Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron unveiled their groundbreaking plan for a €500bn pandemic recovery fund last May, one leading German politician expressed deep misgivings. This weekend, he might be elected leader of Ms Merkel’s party.
Friedrich Merz said the idea of the EU raising money on financial markets and distributing it as grants to member states was “bumping against the limits of the [EU] treaties”.
As an MP he had promised voters that the eurozone would not become a “transfer union” — a system where rich nations like Germany bail out their poorer neighbours. “I feel myself to be bound by this promise,” he said.
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