What happened at the Berlin Wall?
Interview given by Egon Krenz, former president of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), to Zeitung vum Lëtzebuerger Vollek, daily paper of the Communist Party of Luxembourg. 9 November 2009 Translated from German Was the opening of the border spontaneous? No, the events leading up to the opening of the borders are ignored today. On the 1st of November 1989 I met Gorbachev in Moscow. We had talks lasting four hours, during which I asked him what place the GDR would have in the “European House” he was propagating, and whether the Soviet Union would continue to honour its fraternal commitment in relation to the GDR. He told me that German unity was not on the agenda. The USSR and the GDR were allies for ever. He even warned me about what he termed “Helmut Kohl’s politics, who had wagered everything on the horse of nationalism.” I still trusted Gorbachev. I didn’t know at that time that his emissaries had long since made contact with Bonn to establish what price Bonn was prepared
