Europe must seek to “achieve independence” from the United States, Germany’s likely next chancellor Friedrich Merz said after his opposition conservatives won elections on Sunday, in a vote that also saw surging support for the far-right.

Reuters, the news and media division of Thomson Reuters, is the world’s largest multimedia news provider, reaching billions of people worldwide every day. Reuters provides business, financial, national and international news to professionals via desktop terminals, the world's media organizations, industry events and directly to consumers.