In Their Own Words: Angela Merkel

Premiering Tuesday, Dec. 28 at 7 p.m.

One of the world’s most enigmatic leaders, Angela Merkel’s life story reveals the woman behind the veil. Born in 1954 in Hamburg, West Germany, her father, a Lutheran pastor, was asked to serve in East Germany, and the family moved there when Merkel was an infant. A surveillance state under Soviet control, East Germany was ruled by the notorious Stasi, the secret police who encouraged neighbors to inform upon neighbors. Merkel learned from her mother at an early age not to speak about her family in public, a lesson that stayed with her for the rest of her life.