and the prospect of more exotic, unforeseen alliances has begun to loom. Roland Koch, conservative leader of the state of Hesse, said Schroeder's attacks would fail to divide the CDU/CSU from seeking to form a government with the liberals. A vote to reappoint Merkel head of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group on Tuesday would demonstrate the conservatives remained fully behind their candidate, he told ZDF television. "The Chancellor is seeking, in my view out of an unbelievable mixture of arrogance and overconfidence, to claim he won the election. But the truth is both camps didn't achieve their goals," Koch said. The unprecedented uncertainty weighed heavily on financial markets, which had hoped for a clear mandate for Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU), their sister Christian Social Union (CSU) and the FDP. They had vowed cuts in payroll costs, easing of firing rules and a simplification of the tax system. --more 2337 Local Time 2037 GMT
