Local elections this weekend in Germany's most populous state offer a vital opportunity for many residents to cast a vote and have a say on topics including housing, schooling, public transport, and social integration. Here's a look at who can vote.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democrats (SPD) suffered a crushing defeat in a key German regional election on Sunday, in a damning verdict on his perceived weak response to the war in Ukraine.
People are going to the polls in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) on Sunday to vote in the state election, with many seeing this as a test for the federal government. We unpick the key players and likely outcomes.
The western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) wants to crack down on people who give false contact information for the event of a Covid-19 outbreak in restaurants, cafes or hairdressers.
Germany on Tuesday placed a second district under lockdown over a coronavirus outbreak at a slaughterhouse, just hours after similar restrictions were imposed for a neighbouring area.
Authorities on Tuesday ordered a new lockdown for an entire district in western Germany – the first since easing coronavirus restrictions and a major setback to hopes of a swift return to normality.
Armin Laschet, the state leader in North Rhine-Westphalia said on Saturday that parts of the state could face a new lockdown as over 1,000 new cases were confirmed at a slaughterhouse in Gütersloh.
A leading candidate to succeed German Chancellor Angela Merkel sparked a row Friday after he accused eastern Europeans of importing new coronavirus cases to Germany.
A couple from the city of Würselen in North Rhine-Westphalia found earlier this week that two scoops of ice cream were a lot more expensive than expected when they inadvertently broke coronavirus restrictions.
No long-distance trains are to stop at Düsseldorf Airport for six weeks and a key route will be completely closed as part of rail upgrades which will affect tens of thousands of people.
So-called criminal family 'clans' have been operating in parts of Germany for decades. Now the scale of the problem has been revealed in one western state for the first time.
Toys and models manufacturer Revell based in North Rhine-Westphalia has announced that one of their products, an aircraft described as a war machine during the Nazi period, will no longer be produced.
After a tornado swept through the Lower Rhine region of North Rhine-Westphalia on Wednesday evening, at least two people have been injured and property has been badly damaged.
On Tuesday morning, officers in three German states raided properties belonging to “Osmanen Germania” - a Turkish nationalist biker gang with suspected links to Turkey’s President.
Pro-Kurdish demonstrators staged protests against Turkey's military offensive in northern Syria on Sunday scuffling with Turks and German police at Düsseldorf airport, while in Britain they
temporarily closed two train stations, authorities said.
The head of a far-right organization in the western town of Bielefeld was sentenced to half a year in prison on Thursday for calling someone a “cheeky Jewish functionary.”
