Episode description

Today, we look at the projected election results from Germany.

The conservative Christian Democrats (CDU)/CSU party will be the largest party in the next German parliament with 30% of the vote and will look to form a coalition government, though not with the party that looks to have come second, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD).

That’s because of a pact among the parties further to the centre not to work with those who they view as too extreme.

Europe editor Katya Adler gives her take from Berlin. Katja Hoyer, historian, journalist and author of Beyond the Wall: East Germany 1949-1990, puts it into historical context. Patrick English, director of political analytics at YouGov explains what the numbers tell us.

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New episodes released every day. If you're in the UK, for more News and Current Affairs podcasts from the BBC, listen on BBC Sounds: https://bit.ly/3ENLcS1 Newscast brings you daily analysis of the latest political news stories from the BBC. It was presented by James Cook. It was made by Chris Flynn. The technical producer was Dafydd Evans. The assistant editor is Chris Gray. The editor is Sam Bonham.