Frank-Walter Steinmeier was elected on Sunday February 13 for a second five-year term as President of the Federal Republic of Germany, an essentially honorary function.
The result of the vote by secret ballot of the college of electors is not a surprise since most of the main political parties in the country had previously announced their support for the reappointment of the outgoing president.
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, former Minister of Foreign Affairs, is appreciated for his attachment to good relations between the country's major parties.
His re-election is considered a guarantee of continuity in a country which changed chancellor last year after sixteen years of Angela Merkel's mandate and has not yet emerged from the Covid-19 crisis.
"Don't underestimate the power of democracy"
In a speech delivered just after the election results were announced, he promised to fight for democracy while blaming Russia for threatening Europe with armed conflict in Ukraine.
"I can only warn [Russian President Vladimir Putin], he said. Don't underestimate the power of democracy."
Re-elected German head of state Frank-Walter Steinmeier said on Sunday that Moscow bore "responsibility" for a risk of "war" in Europe due to tensions around Ukraine, on the eve of a visit by the Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Kiev then in Moscow.
"We are in the middle of a risk of military conflict, of war in Eastern Europe and it is Russia which bears the responsibility", declared Frank-Walter Steinmeier just after his re-election.
The former head of German diplomacy, a social democrat close to Olaf Scholz, has thus tried to clarify the position of his country, criticized in recent weeks by Ukraine and some of its Western partners for being too complacent. towards Moscow.
"Nourishing the precious friendship that unites Germany and France"
Former right-hand man of the former Social Democrat Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, Frank-Walter Steinmeier was then Minister of Foreign Affairs to Angela Merkel.
The electoral college called which re-elected him on Sunday brings together the members of the Federal Parliament, several hundred elected officials from the Länder and representatives of civil society.
Among the participants in the ballot were Angela Merkel, but also the medical director of the pharmaceutical laboratory BioNTech, Özlem Türeci, or even the most famous "drag queen" of Berlin, Gloria Viagra.
French President Emmanuel Macron was one of the first foreign officials to congratulate his counterpart: "Together, let's continue to nurture the precious friendship that unites Germany and France and to promote our European values," he said. this in a message posted on Twitter.
With AFP and Reuters
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