Christian Democratic Union of Germany

Leader	Angela Merkel (Chancellor)
Headquarters	Klingelhöferstraße 8 10785 Berlin
Ideology	Christian Democracy, Conservatism
Political position	Centrism/Centre-right
European affiliation	European People's Party
International affiliation	Christian Democrat International and International Democrat Union
European Parliament group	European People's Party - European Democrats
Colours	Black, Orange
Website
http://www.cdu.de

Party headquarters,
the CDU haus in Berlin

The Christian Democratic Union of Germany or Christlich Demokratische Union Deutschlands (CDU) is one of the two main right of centre political parties in Germany. It describes itself as

a Christian democratic, liberal and conservative party of the centre.

In November 2005 the Federal leader of the CDU Dr. Angela Merkel became the Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany.

History

The CDU was founded after World War II. The first German Chancellor was Konrad Adenauer, a member of the CDU. He ruled from 1949-1963. During the Government of Helmut Kohl (1982-1998), Germany was reunited.

The CDU was the Government Party for most of the younger German history, only from 1969-1982 and from 1998-2005 there have been Chancellors from different parties.

Members

The CDU has more than 400,000 members. It has 255 of 631 Members of Parliament in the German Parliament (Deutscher Bundestag) and 34 of 99 Members of European Parliament of Germany.