Never mind Eurovision. For Germany, the state election in North Rhine Westphalia on Sunday was the big one – the best indication of how Germans will vote in their national election in four months time. The result was a ‘political earthquake’ according to German media – a humiliation for Martin Schulz’s Social Democrats, and a spectacular
Two 16-year-old schoolgirls from a sink estate in Bradford find fun and happiness by shacking up with a middle-aged married man — if you’ve never seen it, it sounds like the worst movie ever made. Yet Rita, Sue and Bob Too was a delight, one of the best British films of the 1980s, and this
Since December, when Islamic terrorist Anis Amri drove a truck into a Berlin Christmas market, Germans have been waiting fearfully for the next Islamist attack. However right-wing terrorism is also a growing concern in Germany, and the latest case to come to light shows how this extremist movement may be evolving. Germany’s Military Intelligence is
Most mornings, if I’m not too hung-over, I go for a run around Ruislip Lido — a mile there, through Ruislip Woods, about two miles round the lido and a mile back again. It generally takes me about half an hour. On my way, I see woodpeckers, egrets, sparrowhawks, and the occasional Muntjac deer. It’s
Go into any high street bookshop and find the European history section. There’s usually a shelf or two on France and about the same on Germany, but the difference between these two categories is apparent straight away. The French stuff spans several centuries, whereas German history is confined to just 12 years. Yes, a lifetime
Is Ivanka Trump’s visit to Berlin a triumph for Angela Merkel, or a diplomatic disaster? As always, that depends on which newspapers you read. Germany’s Suddeutsche Zeitung called it a ‘a veritable coup for the chancellor,’ but the headlines in the British press have focused on the boos that greeted Ivanka at yesterday’s W20 Summit,
In Westminster, all the general election chatter is about Brexit. Will Tory Remainers turn Lib Dem? Will Labour leavers desert Jeremy Corbyn? As polling day draws near, however, the Europe obsession must recede. Politicians may not be able to look past last year’s referendum, but voters will have moved on. MPs will find that, as
It seems the rush to blame the Borussia Dortmund bus bombing on Islamist extremists was wrong. German police have now arrested a 28 year-old man in connection with the incident; and despite initial assumptions that this assault was the work of Islamic terrorists, it appears this latest suspect has no connection with Islamic State. A week ago,
In Westminster, all the general election chatter is about Brexit. Will Tory Remainers turn Lib Dem? Will Labour leavers desert Jeremy Corbyn? As polling day draws near, however, the Europe obsession must recede. Politicians may not be able to look past last year’s referendum, but voters will have moved on. MPs will find that, as
Germany lost a football match but won a moral victory last night, when Borussia Dortmund were defeated 3-2 at home by Monaco, in the first leg of the quarter finals of the Champions League. To restage a major fixture just 24 hours after a terrorist attack was a remarkable achievement. To restage it when the
Once again, the pollsters got it wrong. Yesterday’s election in Saarland was supposed to be the beginning of the end for Angela Merkel, and the start of the SPD revival under their new leader Martin Schulz. And yet, against the odds, Merkel’s conservative CDU has beaten the left-leaning SPD by more than ten per cent,
Blistering barnacles! Thundering typhoons! What dastardly double-dealing! To bolster their puny team of pen-pushing, quota-quoting civil servants, those fiendish Brussels bureaucrats have recruited Europe’s greatest investigative reporter. With Tintin on the EU’s side in the forthcoming Brexit negotiations, do our valiant Brexiteers stand any chance at all? No idea what I’m on about? Then let
The irresistible force meets the immovable object in Washington tomorrow, as Donald Trump finally comes face to face with Angela Merkel. It seems highly unlikely that they’ll emerge from this meeting holding hands. Not only do these two world leaders disagree about (almost) everything, their personalities could hardly be less compatible. Mrs May may simper
The news about the machete man in the Louvre broke just as my Eurostar was approaching Paris. Was this just a one-off, or were there more terrorist attacks to come? In the Gare du Nord that lunchtime, the atmosphere was humdrum. Armed policemen passed by like ghosts, unseen and unnoticed. For Parisians, these incidents have
Donald Trump’s Times interview has been a big story in Britain, but the President Elect’s parallel interview with Bild Zeitung (Europe’s largest circulation newspaper) has made an even bigger splash in Germany. Why so? Because Trump’s comments about Germany were a lot more pointed – and specific – than the pro-Brexit platitudes he tossed to
Here in Munich, in the gallery that Hitler built, this year’s big hit show is a spectacular display of modern art. Postwar: Art Between the Pacific and the Atlantic, 1945–1965 is a massive survey of international modernism, curated with typical Germanic can-do. Talk about ruthless efficiency — even the catalogue weighs several kilograms. All the
Amid the flurry of famous deaths during 2016, one particular passing has been more or less forgotten. Peter Cook’s third and final wife, Lin Cook, died on the eve of Advent, at the age of 71, shortly after the BBC broadcast Victor Lewis-Smith’s new documentary about Peter, for which Lin gave a rare interview. I
Back in the summer of 2015, a year before the Brexit vote, I was summoned to the German Embassy in London for a special briefing by a senior member of Germany’s Social Democrats. The man from the SPD didn’t mince his words: David Cameron might secure a few small concessions in his forthcoming renegotiation with
I’m sitting by the pool in a lush Moroccan garden playing chess with Nigel Short, and I feel like an amateur boxer who’s stepped into the ring with Mike Tyson. This is the man who took on World Chess Champion Gary Kasparov. He could destroy me in an instant. Actually, there’s no need. In a
In 1942, a man called Manfred Alexander turned up, unannounced, on my grandfather’s doorstep in Berlin. My grandfather knew him only slightly. He hadn’t seen him for several years. Like countless Jews, Manfred had been herded onto an eastbound train the year before, bound for God knows where. He’d ended up in a Concentration Camp
