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Germany Tag

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has invited Steve Bannon to speak at the country's parliament next month, the Hamburg-based news weekly Der Spiegel disclosed. "The AfD is planning a meeting for right-wing bloggers and writers at the Bundestag," the magazine reported. "The party has invited U.S. President Donald Trump's former chief strategist Steve Bannon."

Germany's domestic intelligence chief has warned of the threat posed by the resurgence of left-wing extremists in the country. The Left-wing extremists were engaged in violence against police and political opponents in Germany, Thomas Haldenwang, president of country's Office for the Protection of the Constitution, told German newspaper Die Welt am Sonntag.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel welcomed former U.S. President Barack Obama in Berlin on Saturday. The meeting was closed to the press. The German government spokesman, Steffen Seibert, declined comment on the content of the talks, calling Obama's visit to the Chancellery in Berlin a "private meeting."

Germany's leading Muslim organization has urged the government to appoint a Federal Commissioner to counter anti-Muslim attitudes in the country. "Such a Commissioner is needed more than ever because we have a latent anti-Muslim sentiment in Germany," president of the country's Central Council of Muslims, Aiman Mazyek, said.

An appeals court in Berlin has ordered the deportation of the convicted Palestinian terrorist, Rasmea Odeh. The Higher Regional Court was responding to an appeal filed by Odeh's lawyer, challenging the earlier deportation order issued by Berlin State's Home Affairs Department, or Innensenat, ordering her to leave the country. That deportation was promptly carried out. Odeh is out of Germany.

German police have arrested ten Islamists on suspicion of planning terror attacks. The suspects were plotting car ramming attacks and mass shootings with the aim to "kill as many 'non-believers' as possible," the prosecutors in the city of Frankfurt said.

Germany won't be meeting its NATO spending target this year, the country's finance ministry disclosed. "Defense spending is projected to fall well short of NATO's 2 percent target," German state broadcaster DW News reported Wednesday.

Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, German Chancellor Angela Merkel's successor, has come under fire for make a joke about gender-neutral bathrooms. Her remark was in response to a campaign waged by the left-wing Green Party to introduce gender-neutral bathrooms in official builds in the state of Berlin. She said the third-gender toilets were for "men who cannot decide if they want to sit or stand when they pee" on a carnival-themed TV show.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has backed the student movement behind the weekly climate change demonstrations across the country. Climate change is a "challenge that people can only tackle together," German Chancellor said lauding the student activism. "So I very much welcome that young people, school students, demonstrate and tell us to do something fast about climate change," she added.

Weeks after getting the European Union's approval for a gas pipeline across the Baltic Sea, Russia is moving ahead with its plans to construct a new Black Sea pipeline into Western Europe. Moscow intends to extend the existing Turk Stream pipeline that links Russia and Turkey to supply Western Europe with gas, German state broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported.

The Trump administration's decision to suspend the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty with Russian triggered sharp responses from Germany and the European Union. "Europeans aghast as end to INF treaty looms," the German state broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported, adding that the "EU leaders are concerned that the US withdrawal from the INF treaty could spark a new arms race."