Angela Merkel rebels vow last-ditch bid for migrant deal



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MUNICH: German Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling coalition faced with an uncertain future Monday, as her conservative hardline Bavarian allies vowed a final attempt at a deal on a migrant policy after she was unmoved by her interior minister's offer to resign.

"I said that I would be vacated both my offices," Horst Seehofer told reporters in Munich.

Before that deadline runs out, he would speak with Merkel's CDU Monday afternoon "in hopes of reaching an understanding" that would shape his decision on whether to stay on he added.

Seehofer had a previous meeting with fellow party chiefs in the past.

But other party bosses refused to accept his departure

With Seehofer now making his political future dependent on the outcome, the questions of the Merkel's governing coalition between the CDU-CSU alliance and the Social Democratic Party (SPD).

If Merkel holds firm, he can quit, the CSU could offer a replacement interior minister.

able to break the two parts' decades-long partnership, depriving Merkel of her majority in parliament and pitching Germany into uncharted political waters.

To a Greens or pro-business Free Democrats, or orchestrate a no-confidence vote in parliament that could trigger new elections.

Apparently unafraid of the risks, the CDU on Sunday offered its sister in the face of a European approach versus unilateral measures to slash migrant numbers.

CDU general secretary Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said in Berlin party leaders were "united" behind "effective, humane solutions together with our European partners".

After the Bavarians' relentless pressure on Merkel, European leaders on Friday agreed new measures to reduce immigration and so-called "secondary migration" of asylum-seekers between countries.

Merkel, who has been in office since 2005, warned last week the issue of migration could decide the future of the EU.

Leaders said they would consider setting up "disembarkation platforms" outside the EU, most likely in North Africa, in a bid to discourage migrants and refugees boarding EU-bound smuggler boats.

Member countries could also create economic migration centers.

At the national level, Merkel also proposed that migrants arrive in Germany who should be placed in a special "admissions center" under restrictive conditions.

A document to be sent to the CSU and SPD as soon as they reach Germany.

Sources said Seehofer rejected Merkel's badessment that the EU-wide measures would "have the same effect" as in the EU countries.

That left him with only three options.

He could defy her orders by ordering border police to carry out her plan, which would force her to fire him and almost certainly break up the CDU-CSU alliance, or he could accept a humiliating climbdown or resign.

As the CDU and CSU parties in Berlin and Munich hunted down, leaders on both sides sought to clarify what was at stake.

"It's not about who comes out, but about what's right," Bavarian state's first Markus Soeder told the CSU gathering, according to DPA's news agency.

Meanwhile for Merkel's troops, "the image of the country, our ability to act and our ability to govern" were said to be on the line, said economy minister and close Merkel ally Peter Altmaier.

The Chancellor's Upside Down the House of the CSU's fear of losing its beloved absolute majority in Bavaria's state parliament.

The "Union" of CDU and CSU fused the southern state's beer-and-lederhosen-infused conservatism with more moderate politics, forming a center-right force that dominated Germany for decades.

Political stability was made by Merkel's 2015 decision to keep borders open to migrants and refugees from the Middle East via the Balkans, Hungary and Austria.

Since then, more than one million people have arrived in Germany, while Merkel's governments have repeatedly tightened immigration and asylum laws.

Nevertheless, the anti-refugee, anti-refugee, anti-refugee, anti-refugee, anti-refugee, and anti-refugee.

Opinion polls point to the AfD making a similar entry to Bavaria's regional parliament in October.

Weeks of "Merkel-bashing", however, have failed to help the CSU, as a result of Forsa poll last week showed 68 percent of Bavarians backed Merkel's quest for a Europe-wide answer to migration rather than Germany going it alone.

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