German chancellor Angela Merkel is facing an escalating political revolt after challenges to her position in the refugee crisis from her conservative allies and her Berlin coalition partners. The centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), junior partner in the Berlin grand coalition, demanded Dr Merkel impose a cap on asylum applications as forecasts for 2015 near a million. Meanwhile, her Bavarian allies, the ruling Read more [...]

  Walking clubs are increasing in popularity – and Catherine Murphy is convinced she’s found the perfect hiking destination in Austria.To visit Ehrwald is to experience a tale of two regions, two countries. The pretty, peaceful mountain village is set in the Austrian Tirol but is within hiking distance of Bavaria in Germany.  While you will sleep and eat in Austria, some of your activities will take place in Germany or between the two. Zugspitze (2,962m), the highest mountain in Germany and Read more [...]

BERLIN—Political backlash against German chancellor Angela Merkel intensified Friday as her most conservative ally threatened to take the government to court if it doesn't adopt measures to limit the flow of migrants into Germany. As the number of migrants flocking to Germany has continued to swell, Merkel's open-arms policy has exposed a widening rift inside the government over how to tackle the biggest migrant tide Germany has witnessed since WWII. Merkel has come under Read more [...]

Friday, October 9, 2015, 1:23 PM - Helmut Brunner is probably the last person German firefighters expected when they showed up to extinguish a forest fire over the weekend. That's because not only is Brunner the forestry minister of the German state of Bavaria, he also spent most of the summer warning people about the increased risk of forest fires in that part of Germany. "I completely underestimated it,” Brunner told German radio, according to The Telegraph. "This is really embarrassing. Read more [...]

BERLIN—Political backlash against German chancellor Angela Merkel intensified on Friday as her most conservative ally threatened to take the government to court if it doesn’t adopt measures to limit the flow of migrants into Germany.

As the number of migrants flocking to Germany has continued to swell, Ms. Merkel’s open-arms policy has exposed a widening rift inside the government over how to tackle the biggest migrant tide Germany…

It's the domino effect: What Austria does affects Hungary, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia. The humanitarian corridor is based on the philosophy that countries can't force people to stay where they don't want to be. So, when Bavarian State Premier Horst Seehofer announces his intent to slow or even stop the flow , the backlash from Austria grows in proportion to the backup of people trying to pass through to Germany. "I can't tell you how the situation would develop if we brought people who want Read more [...]

"We need to take emergency measures to stem the flow of refugees, for example turning them back at the Austrian border or sending asylum seekers immediately on into other German states," Bavaria's minister president Horst Seehofer told the Bild newspaper. Seehofer did not go into details of how such a policy would work. The Austrian border is controlled by the Federal Police, which comes under the control of the federal government in Berlin, not the Bavarian government in Munich. 'Violent Read more [...]

In a direct challenge to his fellow Christian Democrat, Chancellor Merkel, who has said there would be no cap on the number of refugees taken in by Germany , Seehofer has announced what he has called "self-defense measures" against refugees arriving in Bavaria. In an interview with German daily "Bild," Seehofer said the state government would agree on a wide-ranging package of measures at a state government meeting on Friday that included "integration, education and training." "On top of that Read more [...]

"We need to take emergency measures to stem the flow of refugees, for example turning them back at the Austrian border or sending asylum seekers immediately on into other German states," Seehofer said to Bild.  Seehofer was referring to cabinet discussions which have been going on within the Bavarian government over the past week. But he did not go into details of how such a policy would work. The Austrian border is controlled by the Federal Police, which comes under the control of the federal Read more [...]

(FROM THE WALL STREET JOURNAL 10/9/15) By Sara Schaefer Munoz in Bogota and Tripp Mickle in Atlanta At the center of SABMiller PLC's efforts to get a better deal in Anheuser-Busch InBev NV's takeover bid is a family whose brinkmanship at the negotiating table helped make them Colombia's richest. For decades, the Santo Domingo family has controlled a web of enterprises. Their sale of Colombian brewer Bavaria in 2005 to Read more [...]