On Thursday, European Union leaders will pause their conference in Brussels for a farewell photo with Angela Merkel, who is attending what could be her final summit after nearly 16 years as the chancellor of Germany.
Since her first EU summit in December 2005, the doyenne of European politics has sat at the conference table with four French Presidents, five British Prime Ministers, and eight Italian Premiers.
There was a rift between European Union members back then, just as there is now with Poland disputing the authority of European Union’s laws.
The EU budget and the rebate that London got from its contributions had caused friction between then French President Jacques Chirac and the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
Merkel told reporters when she arrived, with the pragmatism that would come to define her approach that they would negotiate and make every effort to find an agreement to solve the rifts.
Merkel, a good practitioner of corridor diplomacy, has proven competent at finding crucial compromises to defuse European Union disputes over the years.
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