and welcome my name's christopher spring a good to have you with us it's been the toughest of years for german chancellor angela merkel after painfully long coalition negotiations she's now just emerged from weeks of bitter infighting with hardliners in her own conservative alliance infighting that brought her administration to the brink of collapse radical survives of course but she has been seriously weakened so when she faces the media here in berlin for annual summit news conference in about half an hour's time there will be a great deal of anticipation about the vexed issue of migration is expected to top the agenda as it continues to exercise the minds of politicians both here in germany and elsewhere in europe relations with the u.s. president almost trump in the prospect of a global trade conflict. also likely to feature prominently. and for more on