Key events from the fall of the Berlin Wall to German unity
On October 3, Germany celebrates the 30th anniversary of its reunification, the culmination of a series of dramatic events triggered by the breaching of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989.
November 9, 1989: Guenter Schabowski, a member of the East German communist party’s Politburo, casually announces at a Berlin press conference that the Moscow-backed state will open its borders immediately, leading to the fall of the Berlin Wall, 28 years after it was erected.
November 28: Helmut Kohl, then chancellor of West Germany, unveils a 10-point plan for unification, based on the assumption that the process would take five to 10 years.
February 10, 1990: Kohl travels to Moscow to meet Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. Meanwhile in Ottawa, the victorious powers of World War II agree to accept two-plus-four negotiations with both German states.
March 18: The first free elections are held in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) since its founding in 1949. A conservative alliance led by the East German offshoot of Kohl’s Christian Democrats (CDU) emerges with the largest share of the vote.
April 12: The GDR’s parliament, the Volkskammer, elects Lothar de Maiziere (CDU) as prime minister. He then forms a broad coalition of parties and backs unification with West Germany as soon as possible.
April 27: GDR State Secretary Guenther Krause and Hans Tietmeyer, a top official of Germany’s central bank, the Bundesbank, launch talks on economic and monetary union between the nation’s eastern and western halves.
May 2: West and East Berlin reach agreement on a currency conversion of wages and pensions at a ratio of one to one between the East German mark and the Deutsche Mark, or D-Mark. The agreement followed a heated round of debates and demonstrations across the GDR.
May 5: The two-plus-four talks commence, with the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and France negotiating with the two German states on the foreign and security policy aspects of the proposed unified state.
May 18: West Germany and the GDR sign a Treaty on Economic, Monetary and Social Union.
July 1: Economic and monetary union comes into force between the two German states. The GDR adopts the D-Mark, while border checks between the two sides end.
July 6: Talks begin between officials from both German states in East Berlin on the Unification Treaty.
July 16: Kohl and Gorbachev announce a breakthrough on their two nations’ post-unification military relations. Germany is to remain a NATO member and Soviet troops are to be withdrawn from East Germany.
August 23: The Volkskammer agrees to the GDR joining the Federal Republic on October 3.
August 31: The German Unification Treaty is signed in East Berlin. The West German parliament, the Bundestag, and the Volkskammer back the treaty on September 20 with two-thirds majorities.
September 12: The US, Soviet Union, Britain and France sign an agreement in Moscow granting Germany full sovereignty on the day of unification.
October 3: At midnight, the national anthem rings out at the Reichstag parliament building in Berlin as the country’s black-red-and-gold flag is raised. German Unity Day has been marked as a holiday ever since.
Source: dpa