Germany’s center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) is set to return to power with the far-right Alternative for Germany as second-largest party, exit polls show, after snap elections dominated by concerns over immigration, the economy and the return of Donald Trump.

The CDU’s party headquarters were filled with cheers and applause on Sunday evening as the exit polls were revealed and it became clear that the opposition party was set to become the largest group after Sunday’s election. Outside the building, a small group of protesters had gathered to demonstrate against what they perceive as party leader Friedrich Merz’s hard line on immigration.

Merz declared victory at the event in central Berlin, as he told supporters “Let’s get the party started,” an apparent nod to wanting to get coalition negotiations underway quickly.

If the exit poll stands, the CDU will claim 28.8% of the vote in Sunday’s election, meaning Merz – an old-school conservative who has never held a government role previously – will become the new chancellor of Germany, Europe’s biggest economy and most populous state.

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) came in second, according to the exit poll, with an unprecedented 20.2%, meaning the party – once on the fringes as officially suspected of extremism now a major political force. However it faces exclusion from government by other parties, due to what a “firewall” arrangement.

The mood at the AfD election party was ecstatic as it emerged that the party had almost doubled its support, with people cheering and waving Germany flags. Party co-leader Alice Weidel took to the stage to tell cheering crowds that the AfD had “never been stronger.”

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) looked set to come in third with 16.2% – signaling a dramatic turnaround in the party’s fortunes since the 2021 election, when it took 25.7% of the vote.

Also notable in the exit polls was a successful outcome for the socialist Die Linke party, which won 8.5% – comfortably pushing it over the 5% threshold needed to enter parliament.

The “traffic light” coalition, led by Scholz, brought together an uneasy alliance of three ideologically different parties and its collapse triggered Sunday’s snap vote, a relative rarity in a country which has long had one of the most stable political systems in Europe.

Nearly 60 million Germans were eligible to vote on Sunday, according to data from the country’s Federal Statistics Office.

Sunday evening’s preliminary results cap off an eventful election period that drew extraordinary involvement from White House officials and has once again seen debate rage around Germany’s immigration policies.

Trump sent shockwaves across Europe after he pushed ahead with peace talks on Ukraine with Russia, excluding both Kyiv and European leaders.

Germany’s rebuilding after the Nazi era came under the US-led NATO security alliance and its later prosperity was powered by cheap Russian energy and trade with China.

What was once certain has unraveled and if Merz – who has pledged to tack right and promised to provide leadership in Europe – does become chancellor he has an enormous task ahead.

Two recent deadly attacks, one in Magdeburg before Christmas and another in Munich last week – both carried out by migrants with differing motives – fanned the flames of division in the run up to Sunday’s vote.

The AfD, which has been accused of using immigrants has a scapegoat, capitalized on these attacks for its own political gain, and has even called for “remigration” – the mass expulsion of immigrants, regardless of their citizenship status in Germany.

Both the CDU and the SPD also ramped up pledges around irregular migration and protecting internal security in the wake of recent attacks, meaning that even if the AfD do not take office they have already shaped the debate.

Under Germany’s system it is difficult for any party to gain enough votes to govern alone and it remains to be seen what form coalition-building talks will take.

Some aspects, however, are already clear-cut; other main parties made clear that the AfD will not be part of any negotiations, meaning it is shut out of power for now.

It seems likely that Merz will call on Scholz’s Social Democrats – the other major centrist party in Germany – to build a government. Another potential coalition partner is the environmental Greens, which served in Scholz’s so-called “traffic light coalition” government.

It remains unclear at this stage whether Merz will need one or two partners to form a majority. Three-way coalition governments in Germany are rare.

Overall, it could take weeks of haggling to form a new government, meaning more political paralysis for Berlin at a time of wider uncertainty.

In a war dominated by the unexpected, few imagined Ukraine’s fourth year at war would so firmly question the security of all of Europe.

The most basic tenets have crumbled in this war​. Russia’s military superpower status has weakened, and the Kremlin’s inner circle overcame an uprising. Drones have altered warfare permanently, and rendered warehouses of tanks near-useless.

The United States has flipped from a moralistic benefactor to a transactional predator of Kyiv’s resources. The president of Ukraine has survived physically yet now must deal with a revisionist version of events purveyed by a White House that just over a month ago was his steadfast backer.

Flippant or spontaneous as it may have been, US Secretary of Defense Peter Hegseth’s remark in Brussels that the US was no longer the guarantor of European security has overturned eighty years of norms on the continent. Perhaps it was a bluff to boost European security spending, but you cannot bluff in nuclear security.

The Kremlin will have heard about the weakness in the transatlantic alliance and will be plotting accordingly. In one sentence, Hegseth turned a conflict, in which Moscow had been roundly diminished and humiliated for three years, into the chaotic re-ordering of continental security, in which Moscow may somehow dominate to its west.

With Moscow tied up in Ukraine, the security of wider Europe is for now an ethereal policy debate – an unwelcome distraction when contrasted with the relentless daily horror of the actual fight. After a week of social media tirades and tense microphone diplomacy, the gruesome battle has somehow faded into the background. Yet the acute horror is real.

A Ukrainian company commander serving inside Russia’s Kursk region said his men had to regularly dig new positions in the frozen ground as they were so accurately targeted by waves of Russian drones. “I don’t really believe in a quick end to the war or in peace in general”, he said after three years of fighting. “I am very exhausted, so is everyone here. Nothing changes for us here because of political statements.”

Oleksandr Nastenko, a battalion commander in the 475th assault brigade, said talk of peace had impacted recruitment as potential soldiers were saying “maybe it will all be over in a month or two, I’ll wait.” He said talk of Ukraine collapsing after six months without American aid was premature. “We will somehow figure it out, there is no smell of capitulation.”

Yet a form of capitulation has haunted the opening salvos of the Trump administration’s negotiating plan – Hegseth gifting Moscow with the prospect of Ukraine not joining NATO or recovering territory, before talks had apparently begun. The White House’s revisionism has become an ugly extension of their apparent race to purse a détente with the Kremlin almost at all costs.

Russia’s parallel narrative – that it was forced into action to prevent NATO expansion, and Ukraine must be de-nazified – had been overwhelmed by the sheer weight of its frailty on the frontlines and isolation. It had begun to sound silly – the wobbly excuses of the loser. Yet it has suddenly gained a new lease of life, parroted in part by the world’s most powerful man and his inner circle. It is a potent sign of how the war continues to turn basic norms upside down, that a pressing question on its third anniversary is: “Who is feeding Trump these Kremlin talking points?” Russian state television seems to think it is Russian President Vladimir Putin himself in his conversations with Trump.

Western unity has been an outlier during the war: European nations often differed in how suspicious of Russia they instinctively were, but they spoke as one since Moscow’s full invasion. Yet we now face the world’s pre-eminent power somehow convinced Russia might be a potential ally, and it is their European democratic allies who are the tyrannical problem. It is naïve for anyone in Washington to imagine a future in which Moscow drops its main financier and neighbor, China, in favor of an alliance with the US. Instead, they project frailty at a time when Beijing is actively weighing its next moves on Taiwan, and at times seems the most stable, serious power globally.

On Sunday, Zelensky said he would step aside if it meant peace for Ukraine. The distressing fact is his fraught relationship with Trump risks becoming an obstacle to almost everything. Yet the alternative is worse still. An election in wartime or handover to an anointed successor would simply increase false claims of Zelensky’s illegitimacy.

The dichotomy of the White House’s position is evident again in the inflated casualty numbers they claim is the reason the war must end (millions have not died, as Trump suggests, but possibly hundreds of thousands). This onus on preserving life is not compatible with a peace deal that weakens Ukraine’s defense and risks Russia refitting and coming back for more ground next year. More will die if peace fails or is weak.

The ugliest truth of this moment also needs saying out loud so Europe can be ready. The evidence of our eyes and ears is, as the biggest war in Europe since the forties drags into its fourth year, that Trump favors Putin.

A British couple in their 70s who run education programs in Afghanistan have lost contact with their family after being detained by the Taliban early this month, their children say.

The family urged the Taliban authorities to release Peter and Barbie Reynolds. Their four adult children said the couple have lived in Afghanistan for 18 years, remaining after the Taliban toppled the Western-backed government in 2021.

The couple runs Rebuild, an organization that provides education and training programs for businesses, government agencies, educational organizations and nongovernmental groups. The Sunday Times, which first reported the story, said one project was for mothers and children. The Taliban has severely restricted women’s education and activities.

“They have always been open about their presence and their work, diligently respecting and obeying the laws as they change,” the children said in a letter to the Taliban, shared Sunday with The Associated Press. “They have chosen Afghanistan as their home, rather than with family in England, and they wish to spend the rest of their lives in Afghanistan.

“We kindly ask for the release of our father and mother so they can return to their work in teaching, training, and serving Afghanistan, which you have previously supported.”

The children said their parents had asked the British government not to get involved with their case. Britain’s Foreign Office declined to comment.

Rebuild said the husband and wife were taken from their home in the Nayak area of central Bamiyan province, along with another foreigner and an Afghan.

In a message to AP, Rebuild said the detained couple had been living in the area for more than two years and had Afghan identity cards. It said Taliban officials had previously searched their home and taken the couple to Kabul, before returning them to Bamiyan.

“Then a delegation came from Kabul, along with Bamiyan provincial officials, and took them again to Kabul,” the organization said. “It is now around 17 days and there is still no information about them.”

No one from the Taliban government was available for comment.

New Zealand raised fresh concerns Monday over nearby live-fire drills conducted by Chinese warships armed with “extremely capable” weapons, an unprecedented show of firepower last week that analysts say are part of Beijing’s ongoing plan to build a blue-water navy with global reach.

A Chinese Navy formation held two live-fire exercises in the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand on Friday and Saturday, prompting passenger planes to change course mid-flight and rattling officials in both countries.

Judith Collins, the defense minister of New Zealand, said the drills were unprecedented.

“We’ve certainly never seen a task force or task group of this capability undertaking that sort of work. So it is certainly a change,” Collins told public broadcaster Radio New Zealand (RNZ) on Monday.

“The weapons they have are extremely capable. One has 112 vertical launch cells and has reported anti-ship ballistic missile range of 540 nautical miles,” she said.

Chinese state media have suggested that Western countries should get used to such military exercises in their nearby waters.

Song Zhongping, a Chinese military affairs expert, told nationalist tabloid the Global Times that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy will increasingly conduct exercises not only near China’s shores but also in international waters.

As drills like these will become more frequent, some countries should adjust to this trend, Song told the newspaper.

Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Saturday that while China’s drills complied with international law, Beijing “could have given more notice.”

Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong said she sought an explanation from her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi when the two met in Johannesburg on Saturday on the sidelines of a G20 foreign ministers gathering.

China’s Defense Ministry slammed Australia on Sunday for “hyping up” the drills and making “unreasonable accusations.”

Wu Qian, a spokesperson for the ministry, said China had issued safety notices in advance and that the exercises conducted in international waters complied with international law and did not affect aviation safety.

But Collins said China’s warning was given at too short notice.

“There was a warning to civil aviation flights, that was basically a very short amount of notice, a couple of hours, as opposed to what we would consider best practice, which is 12-24 hours’ notice, so that aircraft are not having to be diverted when they’re on the wing,” she told RNZ.

Collins added that the ships were currently about 280 nautical miles east of Tasmania and had slightly changed their formations, while being closely monitored by a New Zealand navy frigate.

New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters is scheduled to visit China on Tuesday at the invitation of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday hailed Ukraine’s “absolute heroism” as he marked the third anniversary of Moscow’s full-scale invasion, and as European leaders began arriving in the capital Kyiv in a show of support for the embattled country.

“Three years of resistance. Three years of gratitude. Three years of absolute heroism of Ukrainians. I am proud of Ukraine!” Zelensky wrote on X alongside a video showing scenes from the frontline and Ukrainian civilians supporting war efforts during the grinding conflict.

“I thank everyone who defends and supports it. Everyone who works for Ukraine. And may the memory of all those who gave their lives for our state and people be eternal.”

The anniversary comes with Ukraine facing great uncertainty about its future after US President Donald Trump pivoted toward Russia and US officials insist that Europe can no longer rely on Washington for its defense.

European leaders arrived in Ukraine on Monday, according to social media posts and images posted by Ukraine’s public broadcaster Suspilne.

Some roads in the center of Kyiv were blocked and police officers were deployed.

“On the 3rd anniversary of Russia’s brutal invasion, Europe is in Kyiv,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in a post on X, alongside a video that showed her meeting officials at a railway station with European Council President Antonio Costa.

“We are in Kyiv today, because Ukraine is Europe,” she said. “In this fight for survival, it is not only the destiny of Ukraine that is at stake.”

Images posted by Suspilne on its Telegram channel showed Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also disembarking from a train and greeting officials.

Meanwhile, Russia launched another barrage of attack drones across Ukraine overnight, according to Ukraine’s Air Force.

Moscow launched 185 attack drones on Ukraine, of which 113 had been downed and another 71 disappeared from radar after being jammed, Ukraine’s Air Force said Monday.

The attack had “affected” Dnipropetrovsk, Odesa, Kyiv and Khmelnytsky regions, it said on Telegram, without saying whether it had caused damage or casualties.

The attack comes a day after Ukraine faced its largest drone assault since Russia’s invasion, with 267 drones launched, out of which 138 were intercepted, according to Ukrainian authorities on Sunday.

Ukraine’s armed forces commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi also hailed his troops on the anniversary of the invasion.

“The world did not believe that we would survive, but the Ukrainian people withstood the enemy’s attacks with dignity,” he wrote on Telegram.

President Donald Trump spent the first month of his second term on an extraordinary mission — dismantling the global system the United States spent the past 80 years building.

It was always theoretically possible that the West could lose its resonance as World War II and the Cold War became increasingly distant memories. But no one expected to see a US president wielding the ax.

When Trump won last year’s election, there was a sense among some western diplomats in Washington that their governments knew how to handle a president who in his first term often made foreign policy by tweet. But the shock that drove European leaders to an emergency meeting in Paris this week suggests they underestimated just how destructive Trump’s second term would be.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth meanwhile told Europeans that they now need to “take ownership of conventional security on the continent” casting immediate doubt on security alliance NATO’s foundational creed of mutual self-defense.

America’s repudiation of its traditional foreign policy is being driven by both Trump’s particular obsessions and wider geopolitical changes. The United States remains the world’s strongest power — but it no longer has the might that can force others — like China — to live by its rules. Indeed, it now has a president who has no intention of observing any economic, trade, and diplomatic rules at all and is threatening to annex Canada.

Not only that, but the new administration is actively seeking to destabilize friendly democracies and fuel a global movement of rightwing populism. Vance’s speech warned that European governments threatened their own security more than China or Russia because of their policies on free speech and immigration. He also met the leader of the AfD, a far-right party in Germany with neo-Nazi roots and sought to boost far-right parties elsewhere who are challenging governments in France and Britain for example. Trump would rather deal with fellow travelers in a Make Europe Great Again (MEGA) movement than centrist leaders now in office.

So, what can Europe do now that America — the country that rebuilt the continent from the ashes of World War II — seems to be becoming an openly hostile power?

French President Emmanuel Macron, acting on the experience of his dealings with Trump during their first terms, has been warning for years that Europe needed to realize that America had become an unreliable partner. With doubts about the US military commitment to its allies, other members of NATO now have no choice but to hike shriveled military spending.

This will be painful since many of Europe’s governments are already struggling to balance the books and are under extreme pressure to maintain their popular welfare states. And getting all members of the European Union to agree on a more independent path will be treacherous. Some nations in Moscow’s old neighborhood – like Poland and the Baltic states – understand the Russian threat all too well, but some smaller, Western European countries perceive the danger to be more distant. And the EU now includes some leaders who’d love to help Trump do Putin’s work for him in dividing the western alliance — Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban for instance.

In only 31 days in office, Trump has already changed the world.

What to watch for next week

Barring a big surprise, the big international story will be Ukraine.

We may learn more about the prospects of a peace deal to end the war and how it would be implemented when Macron visits the White House on Monday and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer follows him on Thursday.

The visits will be critical to showing whether there is any scope for US-European cooperation on the war — after the continent was shut out of US talks in Saudi Arabia with Russia this week. Both Britain and France say they’re ready to send troops to Ukraine to monitor any eventual peace — but it’s hard to fathom that such an operation could take place without US air, intelligence, and logistical support. Is Trump prepared to do this and risk angering Moscow, which has already ruled out the idea of foreign troops in Ukraine?

Look out also next week to see if either leader shows up in the Oval Office with an offer to raise their own defense spending — to impress their host.

Macron plans to use his visit to try to insert some steel in Trump’s spine following his latest round of genuflecting to Putin and will appeal to the US President’s highly advanced sense of his own power. “I’m going to say to Trump, ‘Deep down you can’t be weak in the face of Putin, it’s not you, it’s not your trademark’,” Macron said Thursday.

The UK isn’t in the European Union anymore, but it’s been in lockstep with Macron and other leaders from the bloc this week. Starmer is seeking to restore the UK’s former role its traditional role as a bridge between its great friend the United States and Europe.

There’s just one problem. Trump doesn’t cross bridges. He burns them.

Pope Francis, who has been hospitalized for more than a week, remains in “critical” condition and developed an “asthmatic respiratory crisis” earlier on Saturday, the Vatican said in a statement.

“This morning Pope Francis presented with an asthmatic respiratory crisis of prolonged magnitude, which also required the application of oxygen at high flows,” the Vatican wrote about the ailing pontiff who is being treated for pneumonia.

While Francis “continues to be alert and spent the day in an armchair” he is “in more pain than yesterday,” it added.

He also received blood transfusions today to treat anemia, according to the statement.

Earlier on Saturday, the Vatican said he would remain in hospitalized following his pneumonia diagnosis and will not deliver the weekly Angelus prayer – for only the third time in his almost 12-year-long papacy.

The pope’s condition had seemed more promising earlier in the week, with the Vatican describing him as responding “positively” to medical treatment for pneumonia on Thursday.

“Is the pope out of danger? No. Both doors are open. Is he at risk of immediate death? No. The therapy needs time to work,” said Sergio Alfieri, a surgeon who has previously operated on the pope, to reporters on Friday.

The pontiff was admitted to clinic in the Italian capital on February 14, and initially underwent tests for a respiratory tract infection. He was subsequently diagnosed with pneumonia in both lungs after a later CT scan.

Francis, who is from Argentina, has a vulnerability to respiratory infections. As a young man, he suffered a severe bout of pneumonia that led to the removal of part of one lung.

In 2021, doctors also surgically removed part of his colon in relation to diverticulitis, which can cause inflammation or infection of the colon. He was hospitalized with bronchitis in 2023, and in recent months has had two falls where he bruised his chin and hurt his arm which was put into a sling.

‘An extraordinary man’

This is the third-longest time Francis has spent in hospital since his election as pope.

His doctors have advised “complete rest” for the pope. Even so, he has continued to do some work, including on the first two days of hospitalization holding his daily phone call to Rev. Gabriel Romanelli and his assistant, Father Yusuf Asad, in Gaza City, northern Gaza. They have been in frequent contact since Israel launched its bombing campaign and siege on the enclave, following the October 7 Hamas-led attacks.

“We joked as always. He hasn’t lost his proverbial sense of humor,” the prime minister said in a statement.

Outside the capital, worshipers have gathered in candle-lit churches – from Argentina to the Vatican – to pray for Francis’ steady recovery.

“We always put him in our intentions,” Rodomina Valdez, a 45-year-old Argentinian in the Metropolitan Cathedral, in the capital Buenos Aires, told Reuters on Wednesday. “But what we can do is put him in our prayers and offer fasting or in any case, some penance.”

Just outside St. Peter’s Basilica, at the Vatican, a German tourist, Klaus, said he hoped the pope “will have many strong years left in him.” And back at the Agostino Gemelli Polyclinic, in Rome, letters and drawings made by children in the oncology department showed colorful illustrations and messages wishing him well.

“I hope he gets well soon and that he can get back to his role,” Gaetano Bavagnini, a Rome resident, said. “He is an extraordinary man and an extraordinary pope.”