Estimated read time: Less than a minute
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
BERLIN (AP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives and the environmentalist Green Party have inked a deal to rule the central state of Hesse that includes the country's financial capital Frankfurt.
The coalition agreement signed Monday is the first between the two traditional political foes in a large German state.
It is seen as a test for a similar coalition at national level in the future.
A pact between Merkel's Christian Democrats and the left-leaning Greens in the city-state of Hamburg collapsed in 2010 after just two years.
(Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
