Germany news: Parliament agrees on debt-laden 2027 budget

These updates have been closed. Below, you can review our collection of news and analysis on stories from or relating to Germany from Friday, November 13.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz got a birthday cake at the UN climate summit in Turkey this week. But he wasn't there to eat it. Meanwhile, in Berlin , climate activists marked his 71st birthday on Friday with a symbolic chocolate cake. Their message: they too want to reach that age on a livable planet.

Fridays for Future is taking its demands to German streets. Demonstrations were planned in more than 70 German cities on Friday, November 13.

Under the slogan "Pay your climate debt," protesters in the German capital demanded more funding for climate protection and adaptation in developing countries, alongside a global phase-out of coal, oil and gas.

Germany provided €4.7 billion ($5.2 billion) in federal budget funds for international climate financing in 2025 — below its €6 billion pledge.

But the protest movement is no longer drawing the crowds it once did . In September 2019, Fridays for Future mobilized an estimated 1.4 million people across Germany. Five years later, that figure fell to around 75,000 at a comparable nationwide strike.

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