Angela Merkel's sister party has suffered massive losses in Bavaria's state elections, exit polls suggest, in a blow to the German chancellor. The CSU is set to lose its absolute majority in the state parliament, while the Greens surged into second place and the anti-immigration AfD entered the state parliament for the first time.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel praised the world renown of German beer in Ingolstadt, at a celebration marking the 500th anniversary of the beer purity law. The age-old rule has remained a staple of beer production. Hundreds of brewers from Germany and other European countries attended the celebration in Bavaria on Friday, with servers and guards in traditional costumes.
In Europe's eastern half, the disintegration of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia created many new countries. In Western Europe, however, borders of the old nation states seemed to be carved in stone and although there have been secessionist tendencies, some of them militant, they never seemed to have a shot in reality, according to a Deutsche Welle report from Berlin.