Angela Merkel has launched her campaign for a historic fourth term as German chancellor under the colours of the national flag, in an attempt to wrest it back from the far-Right.

With three months to go until September’s elections, Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) this week unveiled a series of campaign posters featuring the chancellor against a backdrop of black, red and gold.

It is unusual for political parties to use the flag so overtly in a country still haunted by its Nazi past, and Mrs Merkel has herself chided party colleagues for waving the flag in previous elections.

The CDU said the decision to use the flag had been a deliberate move to reclaim it from far-Right parties which have been riding high on an anti-immigrant message.

The campaign “will be a bit more patriotic than before”, Peter Tauber, the party’s general secretary, told the Financial Times.