Angela Merkel turns down UN job offer

Former German chancellor has turned down the offer of a job at the United Nations. As Angela Merkel’s office confirmed on Wednesday, the 67-year-old politician rejected the high-ranking position.

Germany’s former Chancellor Merkel stepped down a month ago, becoming the Europe’s most powerful politician after 16 years at the helm.

As her office announced, Merkel gave a phone call to the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres last week to thank him for the job he had offered her in a letter and to tell him she would not accept it without elaborating.

The UN chief had offered Merkel the chair of a high-level UN advisory body on global public goods, one of his flagship reform projects. It will focus on issues including the ozone layer, vaccines and outer space debris.

Ms Merkel, a conservative, has stayed out of the political spotlight since handing over Germany’s chancellorship to Olaf Scholz, a Social Democrat.

The former Chancellor is working on a political memoir with her long-time aide, according to an interview in Der Spiegel, but little more is known about Merkel’s life in retirement, Metro US reports.