Hard choices Merz is likely to be the next chancellor -but can he defuse the AfD?

Friedrich Merz, Germany's mercurial conservative opposition chief and a passionate hobby pilot, should be flying high these days as the country's hotly tipped next leader.

- Deborah Cole

One year before the next general election, his Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has enjoyed a comfortable lead for months with about 32% support, nearly double that of its nearest competitors, as the fractious government led by Social Democrat Olaf Scholz plumbs new depths of disfavour.

But the chance at the chancellery Merz has been dreaming of since the 1990s has hit turbulence stemming from the country's inescapable 20th-century history. Whether and how he can extricate his party from the dilemma posed by this month's bombshell state elections will help determine Germany's democratic health for years to come in the battle to win back voters from the pro-Russian extremes.

In this month's polls in two former communist states, a far-right force became the strongest party for the first time since the Nazi period in one region, Thuringia, and in the other, Saxony, it finished a very close second behind Merz's party.

The strong showing for the antiimmigration, anti-Islam Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has left the mainstream conservatives navigating a minefield as all the democratic parties have committed to a ban on cooperation with the extreme right. A third election, in Brandenburg state surrounding Berlin, looms on 22 September, with similar results expected.