Only our own strength, a strong conservative party, can prevent Red-Red-Green from taking power at the federal level in 2017.

Alliances are part of our destiny as a nation, part of our future as a nation and this is what guides me in my policy, what guides my government as a whole.

If you've worked together with somebody very well, leave-taking is very difficult. But we are all politicians. We all know that democracy lives off change. So, in the United States of America, the Constitution has very clear stipulations on this. It's a tough rule. Eight years and that's it, out goes the president and a new one comes in.

The digital world creates situation where there are no secrets anymore.

For my part, in everything I do, I aim to strengthen democracy in Germany and beyond. The United States is also a strong democracy. As we are seeing in Poland, for example, and also in Hungary, it is important that we have counterweights in democratic systems, and I believe they are still strong in America.

Information obtained under dubious circumstances cannot play a role in legal proceedings in a constitutional state. But everything that's available must be taken into account in threat prevention.

The G7 and former G8 group has always viewed itself as a community of values, the annexation of Crimea, which is a blatant violation of the principles of international law, and the events in eastern Ukraine are serious violations of these common values.