The circumstances of Angela Merkel's accession to the German Chancellorship led many to think that she will be a weak, ineffectual leader. There's clearly a long time to go before a judgement can be reached, but the early signs are very encouraging.

First was the way she breezed into the Brussels summit in December, her first international experience, and took over - confounding those who thought she would place maintaining the Franco-German axis at the top of her priorities, and acting instead as an honest broker between the 25 Member States. I heard glowing reports from friends who witnessed her performance - friends of very different political persuasions.

Domestically, too. she has started well. Part of the deal with the SPD was, for instance, that the health care portfolio would remain with the social democrats - a disaster, given Germany's desperate need for bold reform. But my German freinds tell me that Merkel has demonstrated the canny politics which bought her to the top of the CDU. Nominally the SPD still has healthcare, but in fact Merkel herself is running the show, with all the key reform decisions being taken in the Chancellor's office. Deciding what to do and then securing passage into law is another matter, of course, but the signs are good.

Today, the Sunday Times reports some very sound and thoughtful comments on Iran:

Looking back to German history in the early 1930s when National Socialism was on the rise, there were many outside Germany who said, ‘It’s only rhetoric — don’t get excited'...There were times when people could have reacted differently and, in my view, Germany is obliged to do something at the early stages...We want to, we must prevent Iran from developing its nuclear programme.

...Iran has blatantly crossed the red line. I say it as a German chancellor. A president who questions Israel’s right to exist, a president who denies the Holocaust cannot expect to receive any tolerance from Germany.