Merkel: Obama helped GM deal

Saturday, 30 May 2009

A phone call with Barack Obama, the US president, helped achieve a breakthrough aquisition of General Motors' Opel unit by Canada's Magna, Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, has said.

"I spoke on the phone with the American president yesterday and we were in agreement that we had to do everything possible to come up with a good result for this complicated task," she said on Saturday.

"That conversation clearly influenced the negotiations last night."

Germany approved a plan for the auto parts maker Magna to move ahead with a rescue of General Motor's Opel unit on Saturday morning.

"Because of the special [GM/Opel] structures, the talks were a real test of transatlantic relations," she said.