A leading Socialist member of the European Parliament was left ‘seriously injured’ and in need of surgery after being attacked by a group of four young men in the eastern German city of Dresden, according to a press release issued by his party Saturday. Matthias Ecke, 41, was assaulted on Friday evening while putting up posters in the Striesen district, his party said. He is the Social Democratic Party’s (SPD) top candidate in Saxony for June’s European Parliament election. “The attack on Matthias Ecke is an unmistakable alarm signal to all people in this country,” Henning Homann and Kathrin M ..read more

BERLIN — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Monday there must be “consequences” following an Islamist rally in Hamburg that sparked condemnation from politicians across the country. More than 1,000 people participated in a demonstration in the northern German city on Saturday, holding up posters with slogans like “caliphate is the solution” and calling for the introduction of Sharia law. Authorities said the demonstration was organized by people close to an organization called “Muslim Interactive,” a group which experts say rejects democracy and that domestic intelligence authorities classify ..read more

Think you know Ursula von der Leyen? Think again. With the EU election just over a month away, von der Leyen’s team wants to transform the image of the European Commission president from a tough crisis-manager-in-chief to a more personal and warm mother and grandmother who wants her family to grow up in a safe Europe. It’s a return to the family-forward and fun roots of the European People’s Party’s lead candidate, who has, since 2019, steered the bloc through the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent cost of living crisis. Back in 2008, when she was the German family mi ..read more

The far-right Alternative for Germany party (AfD) is in dire trouble as it deals with the fallout of allegations that two of its leading candidates for the European election have dodgy links to Russia and China. During a debate in parliament today, lawmakers from across the political spectrum slammed the AfD, accusing the party of pandering to authoritarian regimes and presenting a security risk to Germany’s democracy. The party is “betraying and selling out the German people,” Marc Henrichmann, a lawmaker for the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) said. The AfD, he added, is a “rig ..read more

Far-right German MEP Maximilian Krah refused to quit the European election race Wednesday, despite allegations that his top aide was spying for China. Krah, from the Alternative for Germany party (AfD), announced in Berlin that he would fire the assistant accused of espionage, but that he would not step down as the party’s lead candidate for the European election, just six weeks away. “If you think this is the end of my candidacy, then I have to disappoint you,” said Krah on Wednesday. “I am and will remain the lead candidate.” The AfD is currently polling in second place in Germany, but ..read more

Fears of an escalation of the fighting in the Middle East following Iran’s attack on Israel are prompting European leaders to take protective measures. French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné on Sunday issued a statement recommending that French nationals living in Iran “temporarily leave the country.” The German Foreign Office has asked its citizens to do the same. “Due to the new level reached overnight by Iran and the risk of military escalation, the French embassy recommends to French residents in Iran who have the possibility, depending on the resumption of international air traffic, to ..read more

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen slammed the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party over allegations that some of its top members are linked with a scandal involving dissemination of pro-Russian propaganda. “I am not surprised that the Czech secret service is currently investigating two candidates at the top of the AfD’s list for the European elections,” von der Leyen said Friday evening at a Christian Democratic Union (CDU) gathering in Hildesheim, Lower Saxony. “They have long been agitating against the European Union,” she said. “They have never made a secret of the ..read more

Germany’s transport minister is threatening to ban driving on weekends to meet climate goals if the ruling coalition does not pass reforms to the Climate Protection Act by July. “The fact that the amendment is still not in force leads to considerable legal and factual uncertainties,” liberal politician Volker Wissing wrote in a letter to the parliamentary group leaders of the coalition, German outlet BILD reported Thursday. “This serves neither the climate nor the reputation of the federal government,” he said. A reduction in traffic to help meet the climate goals would only be possible throug ..read more

Paul Ronzheimer is the deputy editor-in-chief of BILD and a senior journalist reporting for Axel Springer, the parent company of POLITICO. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy sharply criticized German Chancellor Olaf Scholz for refusing to provide Kyiv with German-made Taurus cruise missiles and suggested the reluctance is based on his desire to keep the weapons for Berlin’s own defense against a threat from Russia. “As far as I understand, the chancellor believes that, as he is a representative of a non-nuclear state, this is is the only weapon that Germany has, is the most powerful one ..read more

France’s EU Commissioner Thierry Breton said French President Emmanuel Macron actually “loved” his social media swipe at European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Breton’s dig at the Commission chief, who is also his boss, stirred criticism in Brussels and Paris when he published it on March 7 — but the European internal market commissioner is defiant. “You should know that I leave nothing to chance, I wait for the right moment,” Breton told Libération, which published a long profile about him on Monday.  Breton said that von der Leyen, in a “totally unprecedented move,” had bre ..read more