Merkel’s CDU party debates reintroduction of national service

BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party is debating the reintroduction of national civic or military service for young people, seven years after conscription was phased out in the country.

A faction of Merkel’s Christian Democratic Party (CDU) — led by its General Secretary Annegret Kramp-karrenbauer — is pushing for some kind of national service for young adults, but critics and experts say it may not be compatible with Germany’s constitution and EU laws.

Michael Kretschmer, CDU premier in the eastern German state of Saxony, told mass circulation newspaper Bild on Monday that national service would “help to overcome societal challenges as well as improving [Germany’s] capacity to defend itself.”

But critics in the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), have highlighted the cost of reintroducing some form of national service, which would be derived from a defence budget that is needed to modernise the Bundeswehr.

Fritz Felgentreu, a defence expert for the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), said “compulsory service undermines human rights under EU law,” adding that it remained to be seen whether any future national service could be adapted to make it compatible with the law.

Military conscription was phased out in Germany in 2011 after the government decided to professionalise the Bundeswehr.