Word: bundestag
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...Newspapers write that, but they are wrong. Of course, there is a certain urgency, but it is not caused by me. I feel that urgency. When I drew up the ten-point unification program in the Bundestag last November, I started with a completely different time frame. I thought that in 1990 we would have a contractual or treaty-based community with East Germany, that in 1991 or 1992 we would have confederative structures. Then in 1993 or 1994 we could have unification...
Ever since, Kohl's guiding principle has been to preserve and enlarge his own personal power. Competitors within his own party, such as Kurt Biedenkopf, former General Secretary Heiner Geissler, and the President of the Bundestag Rita Sussmuth were either demoted or "promoted" to figurehead positions. Now, his Christian Democrats are in the lamentable state of lacking any leadership figure besides Kohl...
...last week, Genscher's Free Democrats warned that they would walk out and bring down the government if the Chancellor did not put the Polish issue to rest. Reluctantly, Kohl was forced to choose statesmanship over politics. "Mistakes were made on all sides," he conceded, "including by me." The Bundestag then adopted a resolution calling on both Germanys to guarantee Poland's borders later this month and sign a final treaty of acceptance after unification...
Kohl's proposal, delivered in an uncharacteristically bold speech to the Bundestag, is predicated on the assumption that there will be free, multiparty elections in East Germany. Though the details remain nebulous, the outline provides for a massive infusion of economic aid from West Germany to follow soon after the polling. The two countries would then establish joint committees for determining what political and economic links would be established between them and how extensive the reunification ought to be. "Nobody knows how a reunified Germany will look," said Kohl. "But I am sure that unity will come...
This time Kohl got the better of it. His speech was interrupted with applause by supporters and opponents, and his party's main rival, the Social Democratic Party, at first had no choice but to endorse the speech. Later in the week, though, when the Bundestag formally approved the plan, the SPD began feeling its politics again and abstained from the voting. Kohl also seized the high ground from the far-right Republican Party, which has issued absurd calls for complete German reunification to 1937's borders, which now include parts of Poland. Kohl reassured Germans across much...