Merkel wins party backing, calls for unity

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, sought on the 27 November 2006 to buttress her authority as chairman of the Christian Democratic Union and to defuse an escalating internal dispute about the political direction of Germany’s largest party. Addressing the centre-right party’s congress in Dresden, Ms Merkel reaffirmed key conservative positions, rejecting Turkey’s membership of the European Union and endorsing nuclear energy as a way to cut her country’s mounting reliance on imported oil and gas.