Referring to Angela Merkel as "the woman who made her name by betraying Helmut Kohl", as your Berlin Correspondent, Toby Helm, does in today's Telegraph ("Woman is favourite to lead CDU") is a gross misrepresentation of reality. Either he does not have a clue of what he is talking about, or he is deliberately pandering to British prejudice that most Germans are still treacherous.

It is Helmut Kohl who is guilty of betrayal, having betrayed his own party and the democratic principles on which most Germans believed their political system to be based.

As far as I am aware, Frau Merkel has behaved very honourably during the course of the scandal. It would have been a truly terrible blow to German democracy if she had not clearly distanced herself from Helmut Kohl's criminal actions as the head of the CDU. To portray that as "betrayal" is absurd, and gives your readers a very false impression of Angela Merkel.