Berlin, Jan. 7, (dpa/GNA) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel has placed part of the blame for the dramatic storming of the US Capitol on outgoing Republican President Donald Trump.
Footage of the unrest made her “angry and also sad,” Merkel said in Berlin.
“I deeply regret that President Trump has not conceded his defeat since November and again refused to do so yesterday,” she added, accusing him of fuelling doubts surrounding the electoral result and therefore paving the way for the angry mob.
“A founding principle of democracy is: After elections there is a winner and a loser,” Merkel said. “Both have a role to play in terms of decency and accepting responsibility, so that democracy can prevail.”
Merkel also expressed hope regarding Joe Biden, the veteran Democrat set to succeed Trump on January 20.
Biden’s words and the reactions from the United States’ two major parties “make me quite certain that this democracy will prove itself to be far stronger than the attackers and rioters,” said the German leader, who is to retire from politics after elections in September.
Merkel lamented the deaths in Wednesday’s unrest. “But it is for me a sign of hope that Congress continued its work that night.”
She also noted the confirmation of Biden’s electoral win: “The United States of America will in less than two weeks open a new chapter in its democracy, as it must be.”
GNA