"On a personal level, I am very well and I am pleased to be here tonight. Overall I had expected the time after my mandate differently. February 24 represented a caesura".
This was stated by former Chancellor Angela Merkel, in the first interview released "off duty", after six months of press blackout since the end of her last term.
"Personally, I stopped being a chancellor and this is a good feeling. I set out to do other things and this is also a good feeling. But I remain a political person and sometimes I feel distressed."
Merkel also dwelt on the war in Ukraine: "This aggression has no justification. There is no excuse. It was a big mistake"
