France, Germany issue statement before ‘Treaty of Aachen’ signing

The Franco-German embassy in Dhaka has issued a joint statement before the signing of the historic ‘Treaty of Aachen’.

Senior Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 21 Jan 2019, 07:36 PM
Updated : 21 Jan 2019, 07:36 PM

French President Emmanuel Macron and Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel would sign the treaty on Tuesday in Aachen in Germany.

This will mark the day of the signing of the ‘Elysee treaty’ 56 years ago.

On Jan 22 in 1963, then French President General Charles de Gaulle, and German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer signed in Paris the Elysee Treaty on cooperation between the countries.

That marked the beginning of an era of friendship and cooperation between Germany and France after more than a century of tensions and wars, which led to the 20th century’s two world wars involving many countries and provoked millions of casualties.

It took the great leadership of both heads of state and government to create the conditions of the reconciliation and cooperation 18 years after the end of the war.

On Tuesday after 56 years, the new treaty would be signed in the presence of the representatives of the European Union institutions.

While the first treaty was about reconciliation, the new one focuses on convergence, on bringing closer our socio-economic models and on joint positions in the international fora, in the context of the European integration, read the joint statement.

In addition to the treaty between the two governments, an agreement will be signed between the Bundestag, the German parliament, and the Assemblée Nationale, the French parliament, creating a 100-member strong French-German Parliamentary Assembly.

“In a volatile international and European context, France and Germany recall, in the solemn form of a treaty between our two States, their shared commitment to values as the rule of law and multilateralism as well as their joint responsibility to build a sovereign and united Europe,” the statement said.