BERLIN: Germany said on Wednesday US President Donald Trump’s “misguided policies” were hitting its economy as the fallout from the Middle East war adds to headwinds for the eurozone’s industrial powerhouse.

The turmoil unleashed by the conflict, especially the surge in energy prices, has dealt a fresh blow to the world’s third-biggest economy as it is struggling to rebound from a long decline.

“We are facing a serious threat from a geo-economic shock,” said Lars Klingbeil, Germany’s finance minister and vice chancellor. “President Trump’s misguided policies are having a direct impact on the wallets of people here in the country.” Klingbeil, of the centre-left Social Democrats, also took aim at companies seeking to profit from the crisis, labelling their actions “despicable”.

“It is unpatriotic what we are seeing from corporations,” he said during a speech in Berlin. Officials have voiced suspicions that energy firms are unfairly hiking petrol prices to profit from the crisis, and have vowed to strengthen oversight of the sector.

There are fears that pricier energy and other issues, such as supply chain snarls, could push up inflation more broadly.

Klingbeil reiterated several proposals he had made in recent days aimed at easing the impact on households. These include a windfall tax on extra profits earned by energy firms during the crisis, and bigger tax breaks for commuters, he said.

Germany’s economy had only just been getting back on its feet following the energy shock unleashed by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. That crisis pushed the economy into two straight years of recession, in 2023 and 2024.

Published in Dawn, March 26th, 2026