BERLIN, March 20 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Friedrich Merz's conservatives face their second electoral test this month on Sunday when they hope to unseat the centre-left Social Democrats, their coalition partner at the national level, in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate.
For Merz, however, battling to shore up Western support for Ukraine and facing the looming threat of an energy shock caused by the Iran war, an election he once counted on to boost his domestic support has become uncomfortably tight.
