Concrete wall cannot be a barrier to freedom: Angela Merkel
Angela Merkel
The Berlin Wall dividing two Germany was standing for long 28 years. This wall did not only divide Germany but also divided two ethnicities, men, love, economy, taste, social values and other cultural habits of the two states by the concrete wall which is known in the history as the Berlin Wall.
But though 30 years elapsed since the wall was dismantled in 1989 built in 1961 could not wipe out the disparity of the Germany. An invisible wall still exists there. On the 30th anniversary of fall of Berlin Wall the US news agency Cable News Network (CNN) on Saturday (Nov. 9) published a report.
After the 2nd World War Germany was divided into West Germany and East Germany as punishment of Hitlar who fomented the 2nd World War. Hitlar and the people of Germany was slapped punishment for huge losses of the world occurred during the six year war.
Since its divide the West Germany went into control of capitalistic world while East Germany’s control was taken by the Socialistic world led by Soviet Union.
West Germany was advanced economically while East was lagging behind far away.
On the auspicious occasion of fall of Berlin Wall German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who grew up in East Germany, marked the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on Saturday(Nov.9) by declaring that its collapse proves that barriers to freedom cannot stand.
“The Berlin Wall, ladies and gentlemen, is history, and it teaches us: No wall that keeps people out and restricts freedom is so high or so wide that it can’t be broken down,” she said at a memorial service in a small chapel near where the wall once stood.
"We want to ensure that no wall will separate people ever again. It proves that no wall is so high and so strong that we could not break it."
Leaders of Germany, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic attended the ceremony at Bernauer Strasse – where one of the last parts of the Berlin Wall remains – before placing roses in openings in the once-formidable barrier that divided the city for 28 years.
Italian President Sergio Mattarella said the collapse of the wall opened a new road of history for the entire continent and the world.
"A Europe without walls of division and without hatred is a great opportunity for the citizens to be masters of their own destiny," he said,
Germany marked the wall's demise with an event that would have been impossible in the once-divided city: a concert at the Brandenburg Gate.
Elsewhere in the German capital, soccer fans tore down a symbolic “Berlin Wall” erected across the middle of the field at Hertha Berlin’s Olympiastadion before a game against visiting Leipzig.
Berliners from either side of the once-divided city were able to stroll up to the iconic 18th-century monument to hear the Staatskapelle Orchestra perform Beethoven's Fifth symphony under musical director Daniel Barenboim.
For almost 28 years after the wall went up to seal off East Germany from the West, the historic gate, and symbol of Berlin, remained tantalizing out of reach for West Berliners – a daily reminder of Soviet domination of the region after World War II.
The break in the barricade came on the evening of Nov. 9, 1989, as East German politicians, pressured by events sweeping Eastern Europe, could no longer hold back the tide in the divided city. Delirious Berliners from East and West cried tears of joy as they swarmed over and through the wall, hugging one another.
Although communist leaders remained in power in some Soviet bloc countries after the wall came down, the fall of the 165-mile-long barrier marked the physical, political and emotional end to the Cold War in the wake of then-Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of reforms.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier praised Eastern European countries for their fight against the Iron Curtain that divided East and West for more than four decades.
"Without the courage and the desire for freedom of the Poles, the Hungarians, the Czechs and the Slovaks, the peaceful revolution and the German unification would not be possible," he said.
The foreign ministers of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – once part of the Soviet Union – said the fall of the wall brought back hope not only to Germans, but to all people trapped in the Soviet bloc.
"It signified the collapse of the Evil Empire in the most direct and decisive way – it was the beginning of the end of communist tyranny in Europe," they said in a joint statement.
