Photo: DPAThe head of Germany's Social Democrats, Martin Schulz, a potential future governing partner of Chancellor Angela Merkel, called Thursday for the creation of a "United States of Europe" by 2025. Schulz delivered a passionate plea for a more united and federal Europe at an SPD party congress that was due to decide whether his centre-left party will enter exploratory talks to form a new coalition government with Merkel. "I want a European constitutional treaty that creates a federal Europe", said Schulz, the former European parliament president, proposing a written convention involving civil society and citizens. He suggested a target year of 2025, one century after the SPD first spoke of a future "United States of Europe". Schulz said that if the SPD ends up again governing with Merkel, Berlin's stance on Europe would have to shift away from the austerity approach of Merkel and her former finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble.

Source: The Local December 07, 2017 13:30 UTC