3️⃣ *Conservative Friedrich Merz is the strong favourite to become Germany's next chancellor* after a bitterly fought campaign roiled by the rise of the AfD, a far-right party backed by Team Trump. 🇩🇪 🗳️ Barring a last-minute upset in Sunday's election, *Merz's CDU/CSU bloc is leading the polls and on course to defeat Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democrats (SPD)* to make the 69-year-old former investment lawyer the next leader of Europe's biggest economy. *His victory would cap months of political turmoil* since *Scholz's troubled three-party coalition imploded in November* -- but grave challenges loom for Merz and his *pledge to fix Germany's ailing economy* and rebuild its international stature. The *election comes at a time of rapid and unsettling change for Germany and Europe,* after US President Donald *Trump reached out over their heads to Russia* to try to end the Ukraine war, sparking grave fears for future transatlantic ties.