News from Monday, May 17, 2010

Festive Gala Marked Richard von Weizsäcker’s 90th Birthday

On the occasion of his 90th birthday former German President Richard von Weizsäcker, who has been chairman of the Bergedorf Round Table since 1995, was honoured by the Körber Foundation in the Small Hall of Konzerthaus Berlin on Gendarmenmarkt. After some words of welcome from Klaus Wehmeier, the deputy chairman of the Körber Foundation, and a laudatory address given by former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, members of the Staatskapelle Berlin conducted by maestro Daniel Barenboim gave a performance of Richard Wagner’s “Siegfried Idyll,” which was composed in 1870.

In the second half of the festive gala the jubilarian talked about “War and Peace – Lessons from the 20th Century” with Václav Havel, the former President of the Czech Republic, Henry Kissinger, the former US Secretary of State, and the former Polish Ambassador to Berlin and Washington, D.C. Janusz Reiter. The discussion was moderated by the historian Timothy Garton Ash.

Among the 400 invited guests from the political, business and cultural communities were former German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, Annette Schavan and Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, and the federal state prime ministers Wolfgang Böhmer and Stanislaw Tillich.

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