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Angela Merkel: A career in pictures

Angela Merkel steps down as German chancellor on Wednesday after 16 years in power, bringing an end to a political career which has spanned more than three decades.

It is a career documented in pictures at every turn: from visiting fishermen during her earliest campaigns, to talks at the White House, and everything in between.

Here, we have collected just a few from the thousands capturing the woman who has been at the helm of Germany for so many years.

News imageEPA German Chancellor Angela Merkel (R) during the military grand tattoo in her honour at the defence ministry in Berlin, Germany, 02 December 2021EPA
December 2021: A military tattoo gave Germans a chance to say goodbye to their popular long-time chancellor as she prepared to hand over power to a new government
News imageAFP A photo taken in 1989 in the northern Polish city of Bachotek shows (from L) now quantum chemistry professor Malgorzata Jeziorska, Joachim Sauer, the husband of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and the German leader during summer school at a university for chemistry students.AFP
Summer 1989: Mrs Merkel (pictured far right) with Malgorzata Jeziorska and future husband Joachim Sauer at a university summer school for chemistry in Poland
News imageGetty Images Election campaign, visiting a fisherman's hut in Lobbe on the island of Ruegen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in November 1990Getty Images
November 1990: By the next year, she was campaigning in the first German federal election to be held since the country was reunified
News imageGetty Images Merkel, Angela - Politician, CDU, Germany, Federal Minister for the Environment, Germany - ironing wrapping paper - 1994Getty Images
January 1994: Mrs Merkel was made minister for the environment - which appears to have meant showing off how you recycle wrapping paper
News imageGetty Images Angela MERKEL , CDU , Minister for the Environment , and Horst SEEHOFER , CSU , Minister for Public Health , during a cabinet meeting in March 1995Getty Images
March 1995: Mrs Merkel laughs with fellow minister Horst Seehofer, during a cabinet meeting
News imageGetty Images Angela Merkel sits a covered seat on the beachGetty Images
March 2000: Mrs Merkel was chosen to lead the centre-right Christian Democrats (CDU) in 2000
News imageGetty Images Angela Merkel, head of the opposition Christian Democrats, the CDU, speaks at the Lower Saxony Christian Democratic Party's annual general meeting on July 9, 2005 in Emden, GermanyGetty Images
July 2005: Five years later, she was back on the campaign trail (pictured) - which would lead to her election as Germany's first female chancellor
News imageAFP Italian Prime minister Romano Prodi, French President Nicolas Sarkozy (hidden), US President George W. Bush, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Russian President Vladimir Putin and British Prime Minister Tony Blair share a laugh as they take position for a family picture with other G8 leaders,AFP
June 2007: Despite it being the 21st Century, politics is still dominated by men, so Mrs Merkel - here with Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, US President George W Bush, Russian President Vladimir Putin and British Prime Minister Tony Blair - was often the lone female face
News imageGetty Images Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are watched by Putin's dog Koni as they address journalists after their working meeting at the Bocharov Ruchei residence in Sochi, 21 January 2007.Getty Images
January 2007: Few leaders understood Russia's Vladimir Putin like Angela Merkel. He was also aware that she was reputed to have a fear of dogs but denied trying to intimidate her
News imageReuters German Chancellor Angela Merkel (L) and Peter Mueller, federal prime minister of the Saar region and top candidate of the of the conservative Christian Democratic Union party (CDU) for the upcoming Saarland state election, hold glasses of beer during an election campaign rally in Bosen near Saarbruecken August 15, 2009Reuters
April 2009: Mrs Merkel became a symbol of fiscal austerity in the years which followed the financial crash
News imageGetty Images US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (L) and German Chancellor Angela Merkel address the press after a meeting at the Federal Chancellery in Berlin, on April 14, 2011.Getty Images
April 2011: Hillary Clinton, then US secretary of state, and Mrs Merkel in Berlin
News imageGetty Images Angela Merkel spreads her arms wide while talking to then US President Barack Obama in June 2015, against a dramatic mountain backdrop in southern Germany.Getty Images
June 2015: Mrs Merkel with then-President Barack Obama, after a G7 summit session in southern Germany. "You have been a trusted partner throughout my entire presidency - longer than any world leader," the US leader told her a year later
News imageAFP A migrant girl holds a poster of German Chancellor Angela Merkel as migrants walk in Budapest downtown after leaving the transit zone of the main train station, on September 4, 2015AFP
September 2015: The chancellor's decision to open Germany's borders to refugees in 2015 divided the country. Pictured: Refugees making their way through Hungary
News imageGetty Images U.S. President Donald Trump (R) and German Chancellor Angela Merkel (L) participate in a joint news conference at the East Room of the White HouseGetty Images
April 2018: It also put her on a collision course with US President Donald Trump
News imageGetty Images In this photo provided by the German Government Press Office (BPA), German Chancellor Angela Merkel deliberates with US president Donald Trump on the sidelines of the official agenda on the second day of the G7 summit on June 9, 2018 in Charlevoix, Canada, looked on by other leaders.Getty Images
June 2018: Migration was not the only issue on which they would clash. North Korea, Iran and trade were also contentious and led to moments like this at the G7 in Canada
News imageGetty Images Ugur Sahin, founder and CEO of the biotechnology company BioNTech shows German Chancellor Angela Merkel dummy ampoules of the BioNTech/Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine during her visit to the BioNTech Vaccine Production Plant on August 19, 2021 in Marburg, Germany.Getty Images
2020/21: As the coronavirus pandemic spread across the world, Mrs Merkel won praise for her early handling of the outbreak; some said her science background helped
News imageDPA/Alamy Angela Merkel (CDU), German Chancellor, feeds Australian lorises at Marlow Bird Park and gets bitten, 23 September 2021, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, MarlowDPA/Alamy
23 September 2021: She was never one to put on a show, but then she was not often bitten in a bird park

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