Angela Merkel has been named Time Magazine's Person of the Year. The impassioned article that praises Merkel's leadership style says that 2015 brought unprecedented challenges to Europe, and as chancellor of Germany, she has dealt with these major issues with "humanity, generosity, and tolerance."
Merkel was born in East Germany, studied quantum chemistry, and lived within the confines of the Iron Curtain until 1989. Since 2005, she has been chancellor and was the first female to be elected into the position.
Merkel is only the fourth woman ever to be named the magazine's Person of the Year since 1927.
"I'm sure the chancellor will regard this as an encouragement for her political work, for a good future for Germany as well as for Europe," Merkel's spokesperson Stephen Seibert said, according to ABC News.
Not everyone will agree with Time's praise of Merkel's attitude and policies. One particularly passionate person opposed to to the chancellor is Viktor Orban, Hungary's prime minister, who says that Merkel's refugee policy is an uncontrolled and unregulated process that threatens democracy because governments did not obtain authorization from its citizens for the influx of millions of people to Europe, noted Breitbart News. Hungary is one of the European nations that has erected fences to keep out refugees.
Despite furious opposition that has been attacking Merkel from all sides, she has not wavered from her promise to welcome refugees into Germany.
"At a moment when much of the world is once more engaged in a furious debate about the balance between safety and freedom, the Chancellor is asking a great deal of the German people, and by their example, the rest of us as well," wrote Time. "To be welcoming. To be unafraid. To believe that great civilizations build bridges, not walls, and that wars are won both on and off the battlefield. By viewing the refugees as victims to be rescued rather than invaders to be repelled, the woman raised behind the Iron Curtain gambled on freedom."
