Germany: Merkel welcomes the electric shift taken by the automotive industry
German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the Volkswagen stand at the Munich Auto Show, September 7, 2021. REUTERS - WOLFGANG RATTAY
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1 min
The visit is essential for any German leader: the motor show in Munich, renamed "mobility fair" hosted this Tuesday, for the last time, Chancellor Angela Merkel who ends her mandate in a few weeks.
The latter praised the progress made by the automotive industry in its shift towards the gradual phasing out of the thermal engine.
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With our special correspondent in Munich,
Anne Verdaguer
The automotive industry "
is part of the solution
" to climate change, and not just of the problem according to Angela Merkel, who has been called "the Autokanzlerin", and whose visit did not go unnoticed by Greenpeace activists who immersed themselves in a lake opposite the Convention Center, to protest against the holding of this “mobility fair”.
The automotive industry has indeed long "
resisted
" to embrace the great shift in electrification has recognized the Chancellor, but today it seems to be well underway.
“
In 2009, we announced that there would be a million electric cars on the road, we achieved that in the middle of this year 2021, and I find that when you look at this progression over 10 years, we have won. our bet
”, declared the Chancellor.
► Also to listen: Germany: the twilight of the heat engine [International report]
And to get there, the governments led by Angela Merkel have pampered the auto industry with billions of dollars, yet a lot of delay has been taken.
After the
Dieselgate
scandal
, Angela Merkel had expressed her "anger" against this massive cheating with nitrogen oxide emissions.
But it continued to intervene in Brussels against too rapid a switch to electric and regulations that would have penalized German cylinders, a double talk that would no longer pass today.
► To read also: Germany: highly contested, the motor show offers a new start in Munich
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Germany
Angela Merkel
Automotive