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Merkel Curbs German Campaign to Honor Barcelona Attack Victims

Merkel Curbs German Campaign to Honor Barcelona Attack Victims

(Bloomberg) -- Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany’s biggest parties agreed to turn off music and observe moments of silence at election rallies through Saturday to honor victims of the Barcelona terror attack.

Merkel said her Christian Democratic Union and leaders of the Social Democratic Party, Greens, Free Democrats and Left party agreed to continue uninterrupted campaigning for the German election on Sept. 24 to show that terrorists can’t disrupt western democracies.

“Terrorism can never defeat us,” Merkel told reporters in Berlin on Friday, expressing revulsion after a van mowed down people on Barcelona’s Las Ramblas boulevard, killing 13.

Even though Merkel faced loud anti-immigration protesters at several stops this week, German campaign rallies generally are calm, structured events. Parties agreed to refrain from music, which is usually pumped in via public-address systems before the candidates address the crowd, through Saturday, Merkel said. That would include a CDU rally she’s holding later Friday in the town of Wunstorf-Steinhude, near Hanover.

To contact the reporter on this story: Arne Delfs in Berlin at adelfs@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alan Crawford at acrawford6@bloomberg.net, Tony Czuczka, Kevin Costelloe