GERMANY: Germany woke up to good news for a change yesterday with the revelation that the Chancellor, Mr Gerhard Schröder (60) and his wife, Ms Doris Schröder-Köpf (41), have adopted a three-year-old Russian girl. Derek Scally in Berlin reports
The couple adopted Victoria from a children's home in St Petersburg several weeks ago but the news was only leaked on Monday to the German newspapers.
It is the couple's second child: Ms Schröder-Köpf already has a daughter, Klara (13), from a previous relationship. Mr Schröder, who has fathered no children, married Doris in 1997, three weeks after he divorced his third wife.
Germany's celebrity glossies have already begun a bidding war for the first photograph of the enlarged Schröder family.
A government spokesman said yesterday: "The government press office doesn't comment on the Chancellor's private affairs."
The news was a ray of sunshine for Germans who have been suffering from a collective depression in the last months as unemployment remains stuck at 10 per cent and unpopular cutbacks loom in the new year.
The news of the adoption also demonstrated a surprising show of goodwill towards the couple from Bild newspaper, read by six million Germans and usually Mr Schröder's shrillest critic.
"It's the most moving story of the year," the paper said on its front page.
It continued: "For weeks, the neighbours of Chancellor Schröder in Hanover have wondered: who is the sweet girl with the jaunty brown shock of hair whom Doris Schröder-Köpf carries around so lovingly?"
The adoption was a closely guarded secret of which few of Mr Schröder's political colleagues were aware. Even Mr Schröder's bodyguards were only told at the last minute.
One of the few to learn of their plans was the Russian President, Mr Vladimir Putin, during his visit to the Schröders' home in Hanover in April.
The two leaders have a good working relationship, prompting Bild to speculate whether the couple had had any help with the adoption from Mr Putin, a former deputy mayor of St Petersburg.
The Schröders have visited many children's homes during visits there. During one visit, according to Bild, Mr Schröder was heard to say: "Someone has to help them."
A year ago, Ms Schröder-Köpf, a former political journalist with Bild, became patron of a charity which helps orphans in Russia's second city.
The news comes just days after Bild splashed on page one the only photograph of an emotional Mr Schröder in Romania, standing in front of the grave of the father he never knew.