German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Monday he was "deeply shocked" by his party's state election defeat at the hands of the far-right AfD but vowed to stay the course with tough reforms while seeking to explain them better.

The German chancellor rules out working with the AfD even though he concedes its win in Saxony-Anhalt has upset his party’s foundations.

Merz’s CDU suffers historic defeat as AfD falls short of outright majority