Steinmeier recognizes Schulz as a fighter for freedom

Created: 09/11/2022, 17:11

The late former GDR civil rights activist Werner Schulz.

© Rolf Vennenbernd/dpa

Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier paid tribute to the late former GDR civil rights activist Werner Schulz as a passionate fighter for democracy and freedom.

"Werner Schulz was one of those courageous personalities to whom we all owe the fall of the Wall in our reunited country," Steinmeier wrote to Monika Schulz's widow on Wednesday.

Berlin - "I admired him deeply for his courage, his always upright attitude and at the same time for his analytical skills." Schulz will be missed as an important and highly valued interlocutor.

He will miss meeting him.

Schulz died unexpectedly at an event in Bellevue Palace on Wednesday.

"The news of the sudden death of your husband, who was so tragically torn from life here in our house today, has shocked me deeply and makes me very sad," said Steinmeier's letter of condolence, that of the widow and the relatives deeply felt condolences.

In the GDR, Schulz fought fearlessly and persistently despite repression, first in the church peace movement and later as a co-founder of the New Forum and as a member of the Central Round Table of the GDR for a democratic revolution.

As one of the first East German MPs in the German Bundestag, he was highly respected across party lines.

"We are losing one of our most passionate politicians, who maintained his independence and also took positions where it was uncomfortable."

From his own experience, Schulz had a very keen sense of the distress that freedom lovers got into when states developed into authoritarian systems, Steinmeier continued.

"Early on, he pointed out the growing threat to the Russian opposition and the growing nationalism of the Putin system." dpa