BONN Chancellor Helmut Kohl went on the offensive in his battle for reelection on Saturday, vowing to score a come-from-behind victory against rival Gerhard Schroeder in Germany's September general election. Kohl, pictured shaking his fist by best-selling newspaper Bild, warned that if Social Democrat Schroeder broke his 16-year grip on power Germany would become a second rate country. The match is only over when the referee blows the final whistle, Kohl told Bild in an interview.

So often the team which goes behind at first turns around the match and ends up the clear winner. That's what it will be like in the general election. Kohl's ruling Christian Democrats (CDU) are gearing up for a party conference starting on Sunday in Gremen which they hope will revive a flagging campaign which has left them trailing the Social Democrats (spd) in the polls.

CDU campaign manager Peter Hintze promised on Friday that Kohl, due to leave the Group of Eight summit in England on Sunday, would deliver a revolutionary speech making clear that he was the only man fit to lead Germany into the 21st century. Schroeder, who at 54 is nearly 15 years younger than Kohl, has led a slick campaign which has attacked the government's jobs record and sought to woo moderate floating voters.

But Kohl, 68, accused Schroeder of trying to capture votes from the so-called `new centre' through a gigantic deception.