Norbert Röttgen | |
|---|---|
 Röttgen in 2021 | |
| Member of theCDU Committee | |
| Assumed office 16 January 2021 | |
| Leader | Armin Laschet Friedrich Merz |
| Preceded by | Jens Spahn |
| Chair of theCommittee on Foreign Affairs | |
| In office 15 January 2014 – 15 December 2021 | |
| Deputy | Franz Thönnes Daniela De Ridder |
| Preceded by | Ruprecht Polenz(2013) |
| Succeeded by | Michael Roth |
| Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety | |
| In office 28 October 2009 – 16 May 2012 | |
| Chancellor | Angela Merkel |
| Preceded by | Sigmar Gabriel |
| Succeeded by | Peter Altmaier |
| Deputy Leader of theChristian Democratic Union | |
| In office 15 November 2010 – 5 December 2012 | |
| Leader | Angela Merkel |
| Preceded by | Roland Koch |
| Succeeded by | Armin Laschet |
| Leader of theChristian Democratic Union inNorth Rhine-Westphalia | |
| In office 6 November 2010 – 13 May 2012 | |
| General Secretary | Oliver Wittke |
| Deputy | Ursula Heinen-Esser Armin Laschet Karl-Josef Laumann Michaela Noll Sven Volmering |
| Preceded by | Jürgen Rüttgers |
| Succeeded by | Armin Laschet |
| Chief Whip of theCDU/CSU Group in theBundestag | |
| In office 25 January 2005 – 26 October 2009 | |
| Leader | Angela Merkel Volker Kauder |
| Preceded by | Volker Kauder |
| Succeeded by | Peter Altmaier |
| Member of theBundestag forRhein-Sieg-Kreis II | |
| Assumed office 10 November 1994 | |
| Preceded by | Franz Möller |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Norbert Alois Röttgen (1965-07-02)2 July 1965 (age 60) |
| Political party | Christian Democratic Union |
| Spouse | Ebba Herfs-Röttgen |
| Children | 3 |
| Education | University of Bonn |
| Signature |  |
| Website | norbert-roettgen |
Norbert Alois Röttgen (born 2 July 1965) is a German lawyer and politician who served asFederal Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety in thegovernment ofChancellorAngela Merkel from 2009 to 2012. A member of theChristian Democratic Union (CDU), he placed third in theJanuary 2021 CDU leadership election, then second in theDecember 2021 leadership election. From 2014 to 2021, he chaired theBundestag Foreign Affairs Committee.
Röttgen graduated from the Gymnasium ofRheinbach,North Rhine-Westphalia. After completing hisAbitur, he started to study law at theUniversity of Bonn in 1984. He passed his first law examination in 1989, his second examination in 1993 and practised as a lawyer inCologne.[1]He obtained a legal doctorate from the University of Bonn in 2001; his doctoral thesis was on theCourt of Justice of the European Union.[2]
Röttgen joined theCDU in 1982 while he was still a high-school student. From 1992 until 1996, he served as the chair of theJunge Union, the youth organisation of CDU, in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Röttgen was elected to theBundestag in1994. From 2002 until 2005 he served as the legal policy spokesman of theCDU/CSU parliamentary group.[1] During theFirst Merkel cabinet (2005–2009), agrand coalition of the CDU/CSU and SPD, he served as the Chief Parliamentary Secretary of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in theBundestag until 2009.[1] In this capacity, he worked closely with the SPD parliamentary floor managerOlaf Scholz to manage and defend the coalition government in parliament.[3] He also served as member of theParliamentary Oversight Panel (PKGr), which provides parliamentary oversight of Germany's intelligence services—BND,MAD andBfV.
Following the2009 federal election, Röttgen was part of the CDU/CSU team in the negotiations with the FDP on a coalition agreement; he joined the working group on economic affairs and energy policy, led byKarl-Theodor zu Guttenberg (CSU) andRainer Brüderle (FDP).
From 28 October 2009, Röttgen was theFederal Minister for Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety in theSecond Merkel cabinet.[4] He also served as a member of the Board of Supervisory Directors atKfW from 28 October 2009 to 22 May 2012. From November 2010, he was one of the four deputy chairs of the CDU in Germany.[1] Also, in November 2010 he was formally elected as party chair of the CDU in the state ofNorth Rhine-Westphalia after he had successfully betArmin Laschet in a membership ballot.[5] At the time, he was often mentioned as a potential successor to Merkel as chancellor.[6]
Röttgen, in his capacity as environment minister, led the German delegations to the2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, the2010 United Nations Climate Change Conference inCancún and the2011 United Nations Climate Change Conference inDurban, respectively.
In May 2011, Röttgen announced his government's plans to shut all of the nation'snuclear power plants by 2022. The decision was based on recommendations of an expert commission appointed after theFukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.[7] Later that year, he teamed up with theInternational Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in launching theBonn Challenge, calling for 150 million hectares of forest – an area four times larger than Germany – to be reforested by 2020; the Bonn Challenge was later endorsed at the 2014 UN Climate Summit and supplemented by the New York Declaration on Forests, which calls for an end to deforestation by 2030.
Following the dissolution of the state'sLandtag on 14 March 2012, Röttgen confirmed his intention to run in thesubsequent election as the CDU's candidate for the office ofMinister-President against the incumbent,Hannelore Kraft of theSPD.[8] Röttgen ran against the debt-financed spending supported by Kraft, and even described the vote as a referendum on Merkel's Europe policies.[9] However, he was widely seen as having failed to commit himself whole-heartedly to state politics, refusing to promise that if he lost the election he would nonetheless lead the opposition in North Rhine-Westphalia;[10] 59 percent of respondents to an FG Wahlen poll said his refusal to commit to the state "damaged the CDU."[11]
Following theelection defeat of the CDU in North Rhine-Westphalia by a margin almost three times more than was predicted in polls,[12] Röttgen resigned his position as head of the CDU in North Rhine-Westphalia. On 16 May 2012, Chancellor Merkel dismissed him under Article 64 of theGerman Basic Law as Minister for Environment.[13] Merkel fired Röttgen because she had insisted he would lead the opposition in North Rhine-Westphalia.[14]
The dismissal was seen as unceremonious and highly unusual; ministers are normally given the courtesy of resigning by themselves even after scandals; an example for this wasKarl-Theodor zu Guttenberg one year prior. This was the last and overall second time a minister was actively dismissed on a federal level, the other occasion being in 2002, when ChancellorSchröder firedMinister of DefenceRudolf Scharping ahead of the2002 elections after various scandals.[15] In both cases, the Minister was unwilling to resign on his own. When Röttgen ran for theleadership of the CDU in 2021, some observers speculated he was partly motivated by the dismissal.[16]
Peter Altmaier replaced him,[17][18] whileArmin Laschet took the post of party head in the land.
From 2014 to 2021, Röttgen was the chairman of the Bundestag's Committee on Foreign Affairs. In addition to his committee assignments, he is a member of the German-Swiss Parliamentary Friendship Group.[19]
In February 2014, Röttgen accompanied German PresidentJoachim Gauck on a state visit to India – where they met with Prime MinisterManmohan Singh andSonia Gandhi, among others – andMyanmar.[20] Shortly after thereferendum on the status ofCrimea held on 16 March 2014, he and his counterparts of theWeimar Triangle parliaments –Elisabeth Guigou of France andGrzegorz Schetyna ofPoland – visited Kyiv to express their countries' firm support of the territorial integrity and theEuropean integration ofUkraine.[21] This was the first time that parliamentarians of the Weimar Triangle had ever made a joint trip to a third country.[22]
Together withPresident of the Bundestag Wolfgang Schäuble, Röttgen represented Germany at the funeral ofU.S. SenatorJohn McCain in 2018.[23]
In the negotiations to form acoalition government under the leadership ofChancellorAngela Merkel following the2017 federal elections, Röttgen was part of the working group on foreign policy, led byUrsula von der Leyen,Gerd Müller andSigmar Gabriel.
In 2020, following the resignation of CDU chairwomanAnnegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, Röttgen announced his candidacy for the party leadership; this made him the first official contender in the election.[24][25] After losing the election to Armin Laschet in January 2021, Röttgen announced his candidacy for theChristian Democratic Union leadership a second time on 12 November 2021.[26][27] His opponents wereHelge Braun andFriedrich Merz. Röttgen finished second in the race after Friedrich Merz,who would win the first round of an online membership ballot by 62.1%.
Since 2025, Röttgen has again been serving as deputy chair of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, this time under the leadership of chairmanJens Spahn. In this capacity, he oversees the group's legislative activity on foreign policy, defence, human rights and theCouncil of Europe.[28]
In 2011, Röttgen called for the direct elections of thePresident of the European Commission, a bicameral political system for the EU, and simultaneous parliamentary elections across the EU.[29]
Following the2016 referendum on European Union membership in the United Kingdom, Röttgen co-authored a paper withJean Pisani-Ferry,André Sapir,Paul Tucker andGuntram Wolff which lays out a proposal of a "continental partnership" between the EU and the UK.[30] According to the paper, such a partnership would grant Britain some control over labor mobility while preserving free movement of capital, goods and services.[31]
Röttgen is considered as an advocate of a more assertiveGerman foreign policy. In an editorial for theFinancial Times in March 2014, he argued that the only people who seemed not to realize that Germany was at the center of theCrimean crisis were "the Germans themselves."[32] When Russian state-run energy groupGazprom conducted an asset swap with its long-term German partnerBASF, under which it increased its stake inWingas, Röttgen raised concerns about the deal.[33] In his opinion, expanding Gazprom activities in Germany are "deepening our dependence on Russia."[33] In late 2015, Röttgen called for a review of theNord Stream 2 natural gaspipeline, saying it was a "highly-political subject which carried the risk of splitting Europe" and may "contradict the aims of the agreedEuropean energy policy."[34]
Röttgen supported the European Union leaders' decision to impose sanctions on 21 individuals after thereferendum in Crimea that paved the way for Putin to annex the region from Ukraine.[35] By August 2014, he demanded that Europe respond to the escalation of violence in Ukraine by agreeing to further sanctions against Russia, saying that "[a]ny hesitation would be seen by [Russian President Vladimir] Putin as European weakness that would encourage him to keep going."[36] However, he ruled out a U.S. proposal to arm Ukraine against Russia, calling it a "grave mistake" which "not only would [give] Putin a pretext to expand the war beyond eastern Ukraine, it would also serve his other goal to divide the West wherever he can."[37]
Amid the debate on sending military assistance to the Iraqi government following a dramatic push byIslamic State militants through northern Iraq in mid-2014, Röttgen told newspaperDie Welt that delivering weapons would violate the government's arms export guidelines.
In 2016, Röttgen was quoted byDer Spiegel as saying that Germany might end its unconditional support for Israel due to increasing frustration with Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu's policies. "Israel's current policies are not contributing to the country remaining Jewish and democratic," Röttgen was quoted as saying. "We must express this concern more clearly to Israel."[38]
In 2019, Röttgen warned that Germany would alienate its European partners if it continued to insist on maintaining a temporary moratorium on arms deliveries to Saudi Arabia.[39]
In March 2014, Röttgen was part of a delegation of theEuropean Council of Foreign Relations to Tehran, Iran. In an open letter published in prominent newspapers across Europe – includingEl Mundo,Corriere della Sera,Svenska Dagbladet,Tagesspiegel, andThe Guardian – on 5 November 2014, he joinedJavier Solana,Ana Palacio,Carl Bildt,Emma Bonino,Jean-Marie Guéhenno andRobert Cooper in urging theEU3+3 countries (the UK, Germany and France and the US, China and Russia) and Iran to reach agreement on a comprehensive nuclear deal, arguing "that there may never again be an opportunity as good as this one to seal a final nuclear deal."[40]
In a speech to parliament in April 2015, Röttgen urged his fellow parliamentarians to callthe killing of hundreds of thousands of Armenians under Turkish rule in 1915genocidal and to acknowledge that German actions at the time were partly to blame, adding that this recognition was overdue.[41]
Following the2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference, Röttgen sharply criticized both U.S. PresidentBarack Obama and China's leadership when he said: "China doesn't want to lead, and the U.S. cannot lead."[42] Writing in theFinancial Times in 2010, he joined British Energy MinisterChris Huhne and French Ecology MinisterJean-Louis Borloo in urging theEuropean Union to slash greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent from the originally established 20 percent target by 2020.[43]
BothAngela Merkel and Röttgen, the chief architects of the government'senergy transition plan, are thought to have pushed for a rapid nuclear phase-out with a view to raising the prospects for a possible future national coalition with theGreen Party.[44][45] In 2012, Roettgen's plan to cut subsidies for solar power drew fire from opposition parties and the photovoltaic industry, which said the move threatened thousands of jobs in what was then the world's biggest solar market by installed capacity.[12]
Röttgen has in the past voted in favor of German participation inUnited Nations peacekeeping missions as well as in United Nations-mandated European Union peacekeeping missions on the African continent, such as inSomalia – bothOperation Atalanta andEUTM Somalia – (2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015),Darfur/Sudan (2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014),South Sudan (2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014),Mali (2013 and 2014), theCentral African Republic (2014) andLiberia (2015). He abstained from the votes on extending the mandates for Operation Atalanta in 2009 and 2010 as well as on EUTM Somalia in 2016.
After European ambassadors wrote an open letter, praising 45 years of Sino-European relations, they found thatChina Daily, which is a state-controlled media outlet, refused to publish unless it was significantly changed (in particular, that references to the origins ofCoronavirus disease 2019 in China be removed). The Europeans obediently capitulated to this request. As the head of the German parliament's foreign affairs committee, Röttgen criticised the European back-pedalling:
I am shocked not once but twice: First the EU ambassadors generously adopt Chinese narratives and then on top of that the EU representation accepts Chinese censorship of the joint op-ed. Speaking with one voice is important, but it has to reflect our shared European values and interests.[46]
In a joint letter initiated by Röttgen andAnthony Gonzalez ahead of the47th G7 summit in 2021, some 70 legislators from Europe and the US called upon their leaders to take a tough stance on China and to "avoid becoming dependent" on the country for technology includingartificial intelligence and5G.[47]
Röttgen is married to Ebba Herfs-Röttgen, a lawyer. The couple have three children.[2] In his childhood, Röttgen played theaccordion.[2]
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