New Delhi, July 19 -- BERLIN - Jens Spahn, leader of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag, resigned his position on Friday after he and his husband announced two days earlier that they had fathered a child through a surrogate in the United States, a practice the CDU has formally opposed and that Germany prohibits under domestic law.

The announcement on Wednesday came from Spahn and his husband, journalist Daniel Funke, who revealed they had become parents through a US surrogate. By Friday, Spahn had written to the parliamentary group to say he was stepping down. Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who had consulted with CDU state leaders before calling on Spahn to go, described the resignation as unavoidable, saying that "credibility ...