DAR AL HARB - GERMANY: WE MUST DEFEND CORE VALUES OF FREEDOM & DEMOCRACY AGAINST ISLAM

Merkel: Europeans must defend core values of freedom, democracy against Islamic terrorists

TUTZING, Germany: German Chancellor Angela Merkel called on Europeans to take a joint stand against Islamic terrorists and defend what she called the European Union's core values of democracy and tolerance.

Merkel, whose nation held the rotating EU presidency from January to June of this year, urged EU citizens to view the union not only as an economic bloc, but one of common values.

"We need the European Union as a community of shared values," Merkel said Sunday in an address at the Academy of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria.

Merkel also called the Western ideals of human rights a universal value that reaches beyond the borders of the EU.

"For me, tolerance is the soul of Europe," Merkel said. "It must be our guideline in discussions with the enemies of democracy, with extremists."

Merkel referred to comments by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that called Israel's right to exist into question as an example of where Europeans need to respond in a common voice.

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1) Merkel: Europeans must defend core values of freedom, democracy against Islamic terrorists