Panel discussion with Günter Verheugen

On Friday, 10 May, the city of Chemnitz will celebrate the 20th anniversary of the EU's eastward expansion. Among other things, a public panel discussion and a tram launch are planned. The former European Union Commissioner for Enlargement, Prof Günter Verheugen, former Czech Prime Minister Vladimír Špidla and Polish MEP and publicist Róża Thun will be travelling to Chemnitz for the event.

The discussion evening entitled "Brückenbauer Europas. Panel discussion on 20 years of EU enlargement to the east". Prof. Günter Verheugen, Vladimír Špidla and Róża Thun will be joined by Lord Mayor Sven Schulze, the Saxon State Minister of Justice and for Democracy, Europe and Equality, Katja Meier, and the Director of the Saxon State Centre for Political Education, Dr Roland Löffler. Roland Löffler, will speak.

Admission is free of charge. Representatives of the media are also invited.

The panel discussion will focus on a review of the accession negotiations and the development of the growing community of 27 member states. Seven months before the Capital of Culture year, the discussion will also examine the role Chemnitz can play as a Capital of Culture in relation to neighbouring countries such as Poland and the Czech Republic.

The discussion evening will be moderated by freelance journalist and Eastern Europe expert Gemma Pörzgen. She is editor-in-chief of the magazine "Ost-West. European Perspectives" magazine and works as an online editor at Deutschlandfunk, among other things.

The City of Chemnitz, the Saxon State Centre for Political Education and the European Capital of Culture Chemnitz 2025 gGmbH invite you to this event.

Following the panel discussion, the European Capital of Culture Chemnitz 2025 gGmbH invites you to an international stand-up snack with short cultural contributions on the ground floor of the Luxor. Chemnitz associations with a migrant background will be bringing along home-made samples from their home countries and are looking forward to exchanging ideas with citizens.

Beforehand, at 1 pm, Usti nad Labem's mayor PhDr. Ing. Petr Nedvědický will christen a CVAG tram with the name of his city at the Adelsberg tram depot (open space, Carl-von-Ossietzky-Straße 186). The "Usti nad Labem" tram will be the eleventh Chemnitz tram to be named after one of Chemnitz's twelve twin cities, following the naming ceremony for the "Taiyuan" tram on 26 April. The event is open to the public and representatives of the media are also invited.

At 3 p.m., the guests of the panel discussion, Prof Günter Verheugen, Vladimír Špidla and Róża Thun, will sign the city's Golden Book. The reception will take place in the Green Salon in City Hall. Representatives of the media are invited to attend.

Background:

Every year, the City of Chemnitz organises a variety of events on the European Union around Europe Day on 10 May. This year's panel discussion and tram launch will focus on the anniversary of the eastward expansion and the city's role as a bridge builder between East and West. The reason for this is the historically unique expansion of the European Union from 15 to 25 members on 1 May 2004. With the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Eastern European neighbours Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic as well as the island states of Cyprus and Malta, the European Union grew by 75 million citizens overnight.

Günter Verheugen, born in Bad Kreuznach in the Rhineland-Palatinate, was a pioneer in this process. As EU Commissioner, he led the negotiations with the ten accession states from 1999. He was honoured by Federal President Johannes Rau with the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany with Star for his services to accession. Today he is an honorary professor for European Governance at the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder). He is still referred to as the "father of enlargement".

* modified on 24 April 2024