Time Magazine has named German Chancellor Angela Merkel as its “Person of the Year”.
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The magazine picked Merkel for the way she managed the economic crisis over the summer, and the way she’s now handling the refugee crisis and terrorism threat looming over Europe.
DEBT CRISIS: Merkel has been a dominant figure in shaping Europe’s response to the debt crisis that started unfolding in Greece six years ago and flared anew this year.
Ms Gibbs added: “You can agree with her or not, but she is not taking the easy road”.
Merkel became Germany’s first female chancellor when she took office in November 2005, and also the first person who grew up in communist East Germany to lead the reunited country. In fact, up until 1999 the Person of the Year was actually called Man of the Year.
Many local authorities are struggling to cope with the influx and some Germans, not least among Merkel’s conservatives, fret about the long-term social and cultural implications of such large-scale immigration.
One of the other finalists, Donald Trump, had a dummy-spit at not being selected.
Speaking a day after the far-right National Front pulled off a historic win in neighbouring France, Merkel lauded the contribution to Germany’s economy and society of the “Gastarbeiter” (guest workers) who came in the postwar decades.
Merkel joins the rank of the only three other women to have ever appeared solo on the Time Person of the Year cover.
Nominated… Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Former Olympian Bruce Jenner, who now goes by Caitlyn Jenner, was also on the magazine’s short list for “coming out as a transgender woman”, an act that “prompted widespread conversations about gender identity and issues of equality for the LGBT community”.
When asked about it by The Associated Press, Mr Seibert said he had only just received word on his phone himself.
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Among them, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic terrorist group known as ISIS; Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump; “Black Lives Matter” activists; and Iranian president Hassan Rouhani.
