Provisional results confirmed that mainstream conservatives led by Friedrich Merz won Germany's national election​, while far-right party AfD surged to become the nation's second-largest.

The success of the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, is a sign of the times. Across Europe, far-right parties once on the fringe have gone mainstream.

Germany’s political system is set up to exclude extremists. Yet the country is waking up to a new political reality that has lurched to the right with the once outcast Alternative for Germany (AfD) party now firmly established in German politics.