German Chancellor Denies Coalition Instability despite SPD Crisis

By Staff, Agencies

German Chancellor Angela Merkel insisted Monday that a crisis strangling her junior coalition partner SPD would not distract the government from its work, even as questions grew on how long the fragile partnership could hold.

The center-left Social Democratic Party [SPD] sank into chaos after its leader Andrea Nahles said in a shock announcement Sunday that she was quitting her party's top jobs following a European election drubbing a week earlier.

As the SPD scrambled for a new leader, the chief of Merkel's CDU party conceded that the center-left coalition partner could end up deciding whether Germany goes to the polls before the end of the electoral term in 2021.

"We are ready to keep this coalition going. How the SPD behaves is its decision," Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer told journalists following crisis talks within her center-right party.

She warned however that given the international challenges, it would be "anything but productive if Germany were to go into a government crisis or a lengthy election campaign".

Denying that the issue of snap elections was broached in Monday's talks, she added however that "you can be certain that the CDU is prepared for whatever comes or does not come".

At a separate press conference, Merkel batted away speculation that her coalition was crumbling.

Insisting that she did "not see a signal of instability", Merkel said: "At the moment I only see that the SPD has reached specific decisions which I can't say would hinder us from working."