Charles III is the first-ever monarch to address German MPs in the Bundestag on the second day of his historic visit to Germany on Thursday.
The British sovereign is making his first foreign trip as king to that country, a decision seen as a strong sign of the UK’s desire to forge strong post-Brexit ties with the rest of Europe.
On Wednesday evening, Charles III promised. at a dinner organized in his honor by the German head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, at Berlin’s Bellevue Palace to do “everything possible” during his reign to strengthen relations between the two countries.
He also defended solidarity with Ukraine against Russia’s “unprovoked aggression” and, in a speech in English and German, stressed the need to defend “freedom and sovereignty”.
After a welcome by Chancellor Olaf Scholz and then by the capital’s Mayor, the British Sovereign was able to revisit the subject in his speech to MPs at 11:45 local time (9:45 GMT).
This will be a highlight of his visit. No monarch has ever spoken in this forum.
reconciliation
However, it will not be the first time that Karl has found himself in the pulpit of the German House of Commons.
He had previously spoken there in November 2020 to a sparse audience due to the distancing measures associated with the COVID pandemic. But at that time he was only crown prince.
He had addressed the German legislature on the day of remembrance with a highly symbolic gesture to mark the reconciliation between the two countries after the war.
However, his intervention in Parliament on Thursday is not unanimous. “I find it absurd to let a king speak in the Bundestag,” criticized Ates Gürpinar, the vice-chairman of the small opposition party of the radical left, Die Linke, in the regional newspaper “Augsburger Allgemeine”.
“To welcome a monarch with full honors into the heart of democracy is to despise history,” he said.
After his speech, the prince planned to visit a reception center for Ukrainian refugees, meet with a German-British battalion and move to an “eco-village” in Brodowin, around 60 kilometers from Berlin.
The stay is largely shaped by the issue of ecology, which 74-year-old Charles has been campaigning for for years on the other side of the English Channel.
“New chapter”
On Wednesday, Charles III, King since last September, and his wife, the Queen-Consort Camilla, were greeted at the Brandenburg Gate by hundreds of Germans spellbound at the prospect of seeing the royal couple.
The famous Unter Den Linden avenue has been decked out with the British flag for a visit intended as a solemn occasion to celebrate the friendship between the two countries.
Charles III travels on Friday. to the port city of Hamburg. There he will visit a renewable energy project on the last day of his trip.
German Head of State Frank-Walter Steinmeier hailed the visit of the British sovereign on Wednesday as “an important sign of Anglo-German relations” and said the two countries were “starting a new chapter”.
He recalled that this visit took place six years after the start of the United Kingdom’s withdrawal process from the European Union.
Referring to the “sad day”, Steinmeier expressed his relief that Britain-Germany relations remain strong despite Brexit.
“We are opening a new chapter” in relations between our two countries, he declared.