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Sofia Globe (17 January 2018)

The acting Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, Angela Merkel, will visit Bulgaria this coming weekend. In Sofia, she will meet Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Boiko Borissov on Saturday.

With his guest from Berlin, Borissov will talk about the priorities of his country’s EU Council Presidency, the press service of his Cabinet announced, and about other political subjects.

During the first two and a half weeks of the Presidency, many high-ranking guests have already visited Sofia, including Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, as well as Antonio Tajani, Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker, the President of the European Commission.

The government of Angela Merkel, a grand coalition between her conservative Christian-Democratic Union (CDU), along with its ultra-conservative sister party CSU from Bavaria, and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), is an acting government only, at this stage.

Since Germany’s parliamentary elections on September 24, 2017, no new government has been formed. Merkel’s attempt to agree to a coalition with the Liberals (FDP) and the Green Party failed when the FDP suddenly walked out of the preliminary negotiations.

Recently, Merkel has been trying to get back into a grand coalition. At this stage, she has to wait for the SPD’s party congress this coming Sunday, during which the delegates will decide whether actual coalition talks can go ahead or not.

In case the delegates do not support another coalition of this kind, and new elections turn out to be the only way, Angela Merkel might not be Chancellor anymore. Because of the political crisis in Berlin, she has lost some power, also within the European Union.

https://sofiaglobe.com/2018/01/17/angela-merkel-to-come-to-bulgaria-on-saturday/