If you’ve spent the week following international events, it may appear as if Chancellor Friedrich Merz is on something of a winning streak.
At the G7 summit in France, Germany helped secure a rare display of unity with Washington, while tensions in the Middle East began to ease and Western allies rallied behind a more coordinated stance on Ukraine.
Seen in isolation, this represents the kind of diplomatic progress any German government would welcome.
And yet domestically, Merz's conservative party of Christian Democrats (CDU) is struggling. The political conversation in Germany continues to revolve around the stubborn popularity of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), while the CDU has seen support dwindle even further.
For Merz it is unlikely to be of comfort that his coalition partners in the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) appear to be losing support even more quickly.
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What do the latest polls show?
The far-right AfD now stands at 29 percent, according to the latest YouGov figures – up slightly on last month and edging towards the 30 percent mark.
By comparison support for the CDU and the CSU, its sister party in Bavaria, has fallen to 20 percent, its lowest level in years.
Behind them, the Greens sit at 14 percent, while both the SPD and the Left Party are level on 12 percent. For the SPD, that represents a historic low in this poll.
The free-market FDP has climbed to five percent following its recent change of leader and reported turn to the right, just clearing the parliamentary threshold. The BSW, meanwhile, remains at four percent.
Other polling institutes broadly confirm the same pattern: the far-right AfD firmly in front with support shifting away from the traditional political centre.
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