Germany has been seeking an increasingly bigger role on the international arena through the integration process for the 27-member European Union (EU).

Concurrently holding the rotating presidencies of the EU and the Group of Eight industrialized countries gives Germany a rare opportunity to achieve its goal.

A new loud voice

As Europe's biggest economy and the world's third biggest after the United States and Japan, Germany has never been more eager to show that it can do a lot more than others might think.

The latest convincing move came earlier this month at a Brussels summit where Chancellor Angela Merkel secured a somewhat surprising deal among EU leaders of setting a legally-binding goal for raising the share of renewable energy consumption as part of the EU's ambitious plan to fight climate change.

Merkel called the deal a "breakthrough," vowing to bring up the issue at the G8 summit, scheduled for June in Germany.

For a long time after World War II, Germany's voice remained largely unheeded until it vigorously stood up with France against the US-led war in Iraq in 2003.

As a result, German-US relations were severely strained under former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. But Germany's unyielding stand has certainly won cheers both at home and abroad.

Since then, Germany started to raise its voice over the world's most burning issues. Berlin, once a symbolic city of the Cold War, became a high-profile meeting venue for the world's top diplomats.

Berlin has played host to a series of international gatherings on the world's hot issues since a year ago, including a meeting of foreign ministers on Iran's nuclear issue in March last year, a meeting of the so-called "Quartet" group on the Middle East in February, as well as the first bilateral meeting earlier this year between the US and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea outside the six-party talks over the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula.

Meanwhile, German leaders have never been so outspoken.

Taking the helm of the EU in January, Merkel vowed to help revive the stalled peace process in the Middle East during Germany's six-month EU presidency.

Merkel also called for a combination of civil building and conflict prevention in Afghanistan, and described Africa's development as "of strategic importance" to the EU.
 
Germany's EU presidency has recently been preoccupied by concerns over Washington's unilateral plan to build an anti-missile defense system in Eastern Europe, as Berlin fears that the move could risk a split among its allies.

Germany is worried that the US missile plan, in the name of protecting the United States and its allies, may trigger a new arms race on European soil.

Germany is also concerned that the United States, by building a missile shield in the so-called "New Europe," may even try to wrest Germany's neighbors, namely Poland and the Czech Republic, away from the European family, analysts say.

Merkel even suggested that the anti-missile system be built within the framework of NATO.

On shoulder of EU

For all its ambitions, it remains virtually undisputed that Germany cannot remain powerful without a strong Europe.

Analysts say Germany, even though having gradually dragged itself out of the shadow of war, cannot risk going strong and powerful all alone.

Any unilateral move by a powerful Germany may still be considered dangerous. Therefore, a strong Europe seems to become the only alternative that Germany could take in expanding its clout, analysts say.

Meanwhile, the German economy, driven largely by exportation, has to rely on the integration of Europe to consolidate its biggest foreign market.

Statistics show that two thirds of Germany's total exports worth about 500 million euros including cars and electronic devices, go to other European countries.

Meanwhile, a crisis of confidence is still dogging the European Union almost two years after two of its founding fathers, France and the Netherlands, rejected in 2005 the draft treaty of the EU Constitution designed to streamline the EU and raise its efficiency.

Merkel, expected to present a roadmap for the revival of the Constitution by the end of Germany's EU presidency in June, hopes for a strong push for the treaty during the informal EU summit in Berlin over the weekend.

According to the German plan, a new treaty should be ratified by all 27 EU members before the elections for the European Parliament in 2009, but the feasibility of the plan remains in doubt.

But there is no doubt that Germany will continue to push for a EU constitution and further EU integration despite all the differences among the EU members.

Brand-new transatlantic ties

It remains just as undisputed that a strong Germany cannot afford to lose the United States as its most important ally.

After patching up the strained ties with the United States due to the Iraq war, Merkel is now calling for a new transatlantic market between the EU and the US.

Merkel has repeatedly urged the two sides to coordinate regulatory frameworks to lower bureaucratic hurdles and cut transaction costs, from which Germany, the world's biggest exporter, can certainly benefit.

At the same time, a rising Germany also faces challenges from the US in its bid to seek a "leading role" in the EU, as Washington is bent on building a "unipolar world."

While Germany's diplomacy charts a course which is becoming more independent than ever, it still has to figure out how to deal with the United States, now the only superpower in the world, analysts say.

(Xinhua News Agency March 26, 2007)