BERLIN (Reuters) – France should only be granted more time from the European Commission to cut its deficit if it also introduces reform measures, EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger was quoted saying on Monday.

Oettinger, a former state premier in Germany and a respected leader in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU), joined a chorus of senior German officials and CDU figures to issue warnings against allowing France to backslide on its austerity commitments.

HUNTINGTON BEACH, California (Reuters) – Juergen Klinsmann believes the all-German Champions League final is not a fluke and is confident the Bundesliga can establish itself as one of the top three leagues alongside England and Spain.

In an interview with Reuters, the U.S. coach and former Germany captain said a superb soccer infrastructure, the Bundesliga’s solid financial base and the entertaining style of play are the ingredients that have made it a European powerhouse with the potential to become the world’s top league.

HUNTINGTON BEACH, California, May 8 (Reuters) – Juergen Klinsmann believes the all-German Champions League final is not a fluke and is confident the Bundesliga can establish itself as one of the top three leagues alongside England and Spain.

In an interview with Reuters, the U.S. coach and former Germany captain said a superb soccer infrastructure, the Bundesliga’s solid financial base and the entertaining style of play are the ingredients that have made it a European powerhouse with the potential to become the world’s top league.

HUNTINGTON BEACH, California (Reuters) – Tottenham Hotspur have to qualify for the Champions League or risk losing England’s Footballer of the Year Gareth Bale, U.S. national coach and former Spurs talisman Juergen Klinsmann said in an interview with Reuters.

Klinsmann, who before Bale was the last Spurs player to score 20 league goals in a season and also win the prestigious Footballer of the Year for the feat, said Bale was a tremendous talent but he would need to play on the big stage with a club in the Champions League.

HUNTINGTON BEACH, California, May 8 (Reuters) – Tottenham Hotspur have to qualify for the Champions League or risk losing England’s Footballer of the Year Gareth Bale, U.S. national coach and former Spurs talisman Juergen Klinsmann said in an interview with Reuters.

Klinsmann, who before Bale was the last Spurs player to score 20 league goals in a season and also win the prestigious Footballer of the Year for the feat, said Bale was a tremendous talent but he would need to play on the big stage with a club in the Champions League.

BERLIN (Reuters) – German soccer great Uli Hoeness said on Wednesday he made “a foolish mistake” by evading taxes, a scandal that has hurt his friend Chancellor Angela Merkel in her re-election bid, but hoped his decision to come clean would help repair the damage.

In an interview with the online edition of the Die Zeit weekly, Hoeness said he felt suddenly ostracized by a German society that until recently admired him for building Bayern Munich into a soccer dynasty.

BERLIN (Reuters) – Angela Merkel’s conservatives plunged three points to 39 percent in a leading opinion poll on Wednesday as a tax evasion scandal embroiled a powerful ally of the German chancellor and the conservative party.

The weekly Forsa opinion poll for Stern magazine and RTL television found the Christian Democrats (CDU) and their Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), falling an unusually steep three points to their lowest level this year.

BERLIN, April 28 (Reuters) – Germany’s Greens lurched to the
left at a party congress in Berlin over the weekend by endorsing
a “soak-the-rich” campaign for new taxes, a risky attempt to win
power in September’s election that upset the party’s pragmatist
wing.

Ignoring warnings against raising too many taxes at once
from their most successful leader, Greens state premier Winfried
Kretschmann, the 800 delegates voted to push to raise the top
income tax rate to 49 percent from 42 percent and introduce an
annual 1.5 percent wealth tax on assets above a million euros.

BERLIN (Reuters) – The leader of Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD) took the stage at a Greens party congress on Saturday with an unashamed pitch for them to throw in their lot with the SPD to defeat Chancellor Angela Merkel in September.

It was the first time an SPD leader had addressed a Greens congress. Sigmar Gabriel, whose party would need a coalition with the rising pro-environment party to have any chance of leading the next government, delivered a passionate plea to the Greens to stop flirting with Merkel’s conservatives.

BERLIN, April 24 (Reuters) – Germany’s Greens, itching to
get back into power after eight years in opposition, are
embroiled in a row over plans to raise taxes on high earners
that looks set to spoil a party congress starting on Friday.

Consistently polling about 15 percent, the Greens hope to
form a centre-left coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD)
after the Sept. 22 election, but are lagging Chancellor Angela
Merkel’s centre-right coalition – also likely to fall short of a
majority. The SPD-Greens bloc already controls Germany’s upper
house of parliament, the Bundesrat.