Merz: Europe faces 'historic tasks' to ensure its security

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has said his country and Europe should forge new security alliances amid a rising threat emanating from Russia and China, as well as the rapidly changing relationship with the US under the Trump administration.

"What we used to call the liberal world order is facing pressure from many sides, including from within the political West," Merz said at a meeting of German ambassadors in Berlin on Monday.

He did not mention the United States directly, but ever since President Donald Trump took office for a second term in January, the country's European allies have been trying to come to terms with the fact that Washington's interest in the continent's security appears to have waned.

Merz, who took office in May, spoke of a new systematic rift that had emerged between "liberal democracies and an axis of autocracies that supports itself and actively seeks open systemic competition with our democracy."

Noting that war has returned to Europe, where Russia continues to attack Ukraine, Merz said he had observed the formation of new revisionist alliances, as crises and conflicts overlap.

"We are thus faced with very fundamental, indeed historic tasks in creating a new security architecture which, if all goes well, should be sustainable for several decades," the German leader declared.

He called for a pragmatic approach to security and foreign policy aligned with German and European interests.