Germany news: Pistorius to scrap warship project

The Defense Ministry has said it is ditching an order for six F126 frigates and ordering eight smaller warships instead, confirming earlier media reports to that effect.

"The Defense Ministry has decided not to proceed with the construction of a total of six F126-class frigates," it said in a statement.

"This is in response to the significant delays affecting the project," it added, saying expected cost increases and ‌the risks associated ‌with ​a change of main contractor were also factors in the decision.

As an alternative, ⁠it ​aims ​to buy ​8 MEKO ‌frigates, primarily for anti-submarine ​warfare, it said.

Shares for defense group Rheinmetall, which had reportedly been due to take over the F126 project from Dutch shipbuilder Damen ​in ⁠the second quarter, plunged at the news of the change in plans.

Some 436,000 people were employed in Germany's renewable energy sector last year — a record — but planned energy reforms by the government could put thousands of those jobs at risk, a leading think tank says.

The employment figures are 4% above those for 2023, with wind power the largest employer with 131,000 jobs — an increase of some 30% over 2023, according to the Bertelsmann Foundation.

Photovoltaics accounted for almost 100,000 employees, followed by the production and installation of heat pumps, with around 72,000 people employed in that sector last year.

Jana Fingerhut, a labor market expert at the foundation, said, however, that the government needed to continue to invest in the sector to maintain the jobs.

She said that in the photovoltaic sector, for example, the number of jobs was falling because most solar modules are now produced abroad.

"The manufacturing base that was still so strong in Germany 15 years ago has disappeared. We must not allow the same thing to happen with the production of wind turbines, heat pumps and inverters," Fingerhut warned.

Economy Minister Katharina Reiche is planning to link the expansion of wind and solar power to the development of Germany's electricity grid, but critics worry plans are progressing too slowly.

She is also considering scrapping subsidies for new rooftop solar systems in private households, which many fear could deter people from having them installed.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has invited the leaders of France, Italy, Poland and the UK for discussions in Berlin, two weeks before a NATO summit in Turkey.

The leaders of the so-called E5 countries are expected to discuss support for Ukraine amid the Russian invasion, the role of Europe in bringing the Iran conflict to an end and burden-sharing within NATO.

NATO chief Mark Rutte is expected to join Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the meeting online from Washington.

The NATO summit is scheduled to take place on July 7-8 in the Turkish capital, Ankara.

A 26-year-old Greek national is to go on trial on Wednesday accused of having assaulted a train conductor who later died of his injuries.

The incident, during which the accused is alleged to have punched the conductor in the head, occurred during a ticket inspection aboard a regional train near the southwestern town of Landstuhl on February 2.

Prosecutors have charged the accused with murder.

However, the regional court in Zweibrücken, where the trial is to take place, has classified the case as bodily harm resulting in death, as it says there is no evidence so far of intent to kill.

According to the indictment, the suspect was asked by the 36-year-old conductor to present his ticket during a routine inspection, but had no valid ticket and also refused to show identity documents.

Prosecutors said the accused seemed to become angry and turned violent when told to leave the train.

The conductor died from a brain hemorrhage at hospital two days later.

Train services across Germany were brought to a halt for more than two hours late on Tuesday night after a communications system failed.

National rail operator Deutsche Bahn says it is now investigating the cause of the glitch.

You can read more details about the stoppage and its impact on travel within Germany in our detailed coverage here.

Germany plans to scrap plans to build six F126 frigates, a multi-billion-euro project that would have been the biggest in the history of the country's navy, media have reported.

Both the German news magazine Spiegel and the British daily Financial Times said Defense Minister Boris Pistorius instead intended to buy eight smaller MEKO A-200 frigates from warship builder TKMS.

The news could be a blow to defense contractor Rheinmetall, which had been set to take over the F126 frigate project from Dutch shipbuilder Damen ​in ⁠the second quarter, according to its CEO, Armin Papperger.

The planned change in warship model is backed by the navy leadership, the reports said.

The Meko A-200 frigates are some 120 meters long (394 feet long), considerably shorter than the 166-meter-long F126s.

The F126 project had been afflicted with several problems and delays.

Guten Tag from the DW newsroom in Bonn as Germany continues to swelter amid a long heat wave.

You join us after a tech outage brought the country's trains to a standstill late on Tuesday night. National rail operator Deutsche Bahn (DB) is looking into what might have caused the glitch, and you can read all the details here at DW.

The stoppage came just before DB's supervisory board is to hold a two-day conference where CEO Evelyn Palla is due to present her strategy to restructure Germany's long-neglected rail system over the coming years.

In more train-related news, the trial begins on Wednesday of a man accused of fatally assaulting a conductor during a ticket inspection.

And German armaments company Rheinmetall might be in for a disappointment if media reports are confirmed that a project to build six F126 frigates is to be scrapped.

You can read more about these and other stories in our blog from Wednesday, June 26.