Angela Merkel’s Life in Photos

Merkel, then Angela Kasner, as a child with a toy stroller.

Angela Kasner prepares a meal on a campfire while camping with friends in Himmelpfort, German Democratic Republic on July 1973.

Angela Kasner, 18, with friends at a New Year's Eve party in Berlin in 1972.

Angela Kasner dances with a young man at a New Year's Eve party in Berlin in 1972.

Angela Kasner posing for a group photo during the Mathematics Olympiad in Teterow, Germany, in 1971.

Angela Merkel visits a fisherman's hut in Lobbe on the island of Ruegen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany during her campaign on Nov. 2, 1990.

Then-Federal Minister for Women and Youth Angela Merkel, in 1991.

Politician Angela Merkel in her office in Bonn, Germany on Feb. 15, 1991.

Angela Merkel, then-Federal Minister for Women and Youth on an airplane, in Germany in 1991.

Environmental Minister Angela Merkel (center) serves some coffee as German Chancellor and CDU leader Helmut Kohl (R) and party secretary Peter Hintze (L) look on at the annual CDU (Christian Democratic Union) party congress on Oct. 21, 1996.

Angela Merkel in a beach chair at the Baltic Sea, in Germany in 2000.

Then-Chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union, Angela Merkel sits in a Porsche 911 during her visit at Porsche in Stuttgart, Germany, in 2002.

Angela Merkel stands on a dune as she poses for photographers during a visit to the North Sea island of Borkum, Germany, in 2004.

An Angela Merkel campaign bus in Berlin, in 2005.

Angela Merkel campaigns in Regensburg, Germany, in 2005.

Angela Merkel on the eve of her election in 2005 with parents. Herlind Kasner, Angela Merkel’s mother, from Hamburg was a Latin and English teacher. Her father, Horst Kasner, originally from Berlin, was a pastor in the Protestant Church in Germany.

President George W. Bush and Chancellor Angela Merkel talk to the media at the Bush ranch in Crawford, Texas, in 2007.

Hillary Clinton and Angela Merkel speak during the Munich Security Conference at Hotel Bayerischer Hof in Munich in 2011.

Angela Merkel chats with Pope Francis after their meeting in his private library at the Vatican, in 2013.

Chancellor Merkel poses with other G8 leaders in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, in 2013.

Chancellor Angela Merkel stands in front of her election campaign tour bus before a CDU board meeting in Berlin on Sept. 16, 2013.

Chancellor Angela Merkel and German President Joachim Gauck celebrate with the players in the Germany dressing room after the 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil Final match between Germany and Argentina at Maracana on July 13, 2014 in Rio de Janeiro.

Chancellor Angela Merkel welcomes Queen Elizabeth II upon her arrival at the Federal Chancellery during the royal couple's four-day visit to Germany on June 24, 2015 in Berlin. The Queen and Prince Philip visited Berlin, Frankfurt and the concentration camp memorial at Bergen-Belsen during their first to Germany since 2004.

Chancellor Angela Merkel and her husband Joachim Sauer arrive at the Schloss Bellevue Palace on June 24, 2015 in Berlin.

From left: French President Francois Hollande, Chancellor Angela Merkel, President of the European Council Donald Tusk, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas during a silent march against terrorism in Paris on Jan. 11, 2015 following the terrorist attacks on the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket.

After a break during the peace talks for the conflict in Ukraine in Minsk (Belarus), Chancellor Merkel and President Putin of Russia, return to the negotiation table. Feb. 11, 2015.

At the protocol entrance of the chancellery in Berlin Chancellor Angela Merkel bids farewell to the Prime Minister of Singapore, Lee Hsien Loong, after his visit to Berlin. Feb. 3, 2015.