NEW YORK — German Chancellor Angela Merkel, named Time’s Person of the Year, was praised Wednesday by the magazine for her leadership on everything from Syrian refugees to the Greek debt crisis.
Time also cited Merkel’s strong response to “Vladimir Putin’s creeping theft of Ukraine” and, on its cover, called her “Chancellor of the Free World.”
Merkel, 61, is just the fourth woman since 1927 to be chosen and the first since opposition leader Corazon C. Aquino of the Philippines in 1986. She is the first German since Willy Brandt, the West German chancellor, was named named in 1970.
Not everyone welcomed Merkel’s selection.
“I told you @TIME Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big favorite,” GOP presidential hopeful Donald Trump tweeted soon after Time’s announcement. “They picked a person who is ruining Germany.”
