Sniping, Hate Crash German Unity Fest

In a celebration overshadowed by right-wing violence and political score-settling that excluded the man who was the driving force of reunification, Germans marked 10 years as one whole and free nation Tuesday with proud reflection on the path they’ve traveled and anxious fears of what lies ahead.

German and European leaders--with the glaring exception of the absent “chancellor of unity,” Helmut Kohl--used their speeches at gala ceremonies here to lay out a vision of a united continent in which Western gratitude and generosity propels the poorer Eastern states into the prosperous fold of the European Union.

But the promises rang false even during the carefully choreographed official celebrations, as attempts to portray Germany as a diverse and tolerant country were undermined by the latest in a spree of right-wing attacks and unseemly bickering at the highest levels.

Just hours before the ceremonies, vandals in the western city of Duesseldorf lobbed three firebombs at a synagogue and others scrawled swastikas in a memorial bell tower of the Buchenwald concentration camp. Neo-Nazis also beat up a Russian couple in the northeastern city of Schwerin.

The attacks stirred fresh outrage and shame on a day meant to celebrate social harmony. The leader of Germany’s Jewish community, Paul Spiegel, questioned whether it is yet wise to revive Jewish life in this country in view of the mounting threat posed by right-wingers. Due largely to immigration from former Soviet republics, the number of Jews in Germany has more than tripled in the decade since reunification.

The synagogue attack inflicted little physical damage. But coming on the heels of a July bombing in Duesseldorf that injured 10 immigrants--six of them Jewish--the incident forced those marking a decade of unity to address the disturbing news.

“Hatred of foreigners and extreme-right violence will not be tolerated in our country,” Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder asserted in his short speech to invited dignitaries, including U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

In his keynote address to 1,500 guests at the stately Semper Opera, French President Jacques Chirac exuded an enthusiasm for EU expansion that far outstrips that of the average taxpayer in the alliance.

“Have no doubt about our determination. Have no fear for the future. The expansion is coming, and it will succeed,” Chirac said, addressing prospective new members such as Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic. “Together we will make Europe stronger and more prosperous. We wait for you with impatience.”

Indeed, German living standards in the east now nearly match those in western German states, which made up Europe’s richest country at the time of reunification. But in this time of double-digit unemployment, many Germans--as well as other EU citizens--regard the impending influx of cheaper labor from the east with consternation.

“The European Union needs these countries and their people, with their experience, their knowledge, their history and their cultural wealth,” proclaimed Kurt Biedenkopf, governor of the eastern state of Saxony.

Dresden, the Saxon capital, was the venue for the unity celebrations because the state currently holds the rotating presidency of the Federal Council, the upper house of Parliament. But with its history during World War II, when the city’s architectural splendor was bombed to ruins, and its reemergence as a high-tech showcase for the revitalized east, Chirac praised the Dresden setting as “symbolizing the richness, the pain and the hope of this country and our continent.”

It was Saxony’s role as host, however, that allowed the exclusion of Kohl, revered as the architect of reunification until a political financing scandal last year shattered his reputation. Kohl has refused to name the sources of at least $1 million in unreported and therefore illegal donations, and that obstinacy gave an old political nemesis, Biedenkopf, grounds for excluding him from the list of anniversary speakers. Kohl snubbed the events here, but his absence did little to dull the glory lavished on him for his role in making Germany whole.

German President Johannes Rau, though a lifelong member of Schroeder’s Social Democratic Party, conceded that unity might never have been achieved without Kohl’s guidance and determination. Chirac lauded the disgraced German statesman as “the man of vision” that both Germany and Europe needed. And Biedenkopf, a longtime Kohl opponent even though a fellow Christian Democrat, credited him with achieving the cherished goal of reunification.

The accolades were too little, too late, however, as the atmosphere for Unity Day had already been poisoned by Kohl’s scathing accusations that Schroeder and other leftist politicians had given up on the dream of German unity by the time the Berlin Wall was toppled by peaceful protests in 1989. That set off a round of retorts that Kohl was trying to deflect attention from the funding scandal of his own making.

Kohl’s miseries are set to mount this week when his former chief of staff and longtime protege, Wolfgang Schaeuble, publishes a memoir highly critical of his erstwhile mentor.

As they gathered here for the day of reflection, leaders from both sides of the vanished Iron Curtain congratulated Germans for the phenomenal progress they have made in overcoming four decades of division.

“This has been a great achievement of civilization and a test that most people have measured up to,” said Lothar de Maiziere, the last and only freely elected leader of East Germany before the state disappeared into a united nation.

While politicians and guests marked the anniversary with invitation-only gatherings, average Germans celebrated in a fashion more akin to Americans’ Fourth of July outings--by strolling and picnicking in the resplendent autumn sunshine.