German Interior Minister Seehofer To Quit In 2021 After 50 Years In Politics

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 30th May, 2019) German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said in an interview with a local news agency he would quit politics after the next general election in 2021.

"I've been in politics in total for 50 years. When this legislative period is over, that will really be it for me," the veteran politician said.

Seehofer turns 70 in July. He has led the Christian Social Union, the Bavarian sister party of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats, for over a decade.

Merkel said she would step down as chancellor in 2021.

Christian Democratic Union leader Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer is believed to be next in line.

"I don't see why it won't work out. Angela Merkel and the CDU chairwoman understand each other well. They are obviously a tandem," Seehofer said.

He fell out with Merkel in summer 2018 after demanding a cap on immigration. The chancellor has promoted an open-arms policy, which led to nearly a million of migrants arriving at the German border at the height of the Syrian crisis in 2015.