Last honor for Helmut Kohl

strasbourg - Former Chancellor Helmut Kohl (87) is being buried today. As a European citizen, he gets the first EU funeral of history. 'My husband was European. He always worried about Europe's well-being, which is a matter of war and peace for him. '

Maike Richter is Kohls second wife and young widow (53) who has not waited for years. As a watchdog they determined who still came with him, and especially who not. The unintended sons Walter (54) and Peter (52) were no longer welcome except today at the double ceremony in two neighboring countries.

In the European Parliament of Strasbourg and later in the medieval Dom of Speyer (Spiers in Dutch) and along the streets, thousands of people will say goodbye to Helmut Kohl, who, like his illustrious predecessor Konrad Adenauer, died after his death with a ship over the Rhine is transported. On behalf of our country, Prime Minister Mark Rutte will attend the ceremony.

From around the world, dignitaries are expected. But the three men and the English 'Iron Lady', who agreed with the German unification in 1990 and the withdrawal of half a million Soviet troops, will not be present. Michael Gorbachev is too sick, Thatcher and Mitterand are dead, and George Bush senior is too old.

Kohl's chest will be covered with a European flag. The obese Christian Democrat, who had to fight against the Allies with Hitler's air defense, knew European history like no other. Later he graduated from historian. Free to Thomas Mann, Kohl was a member of a European-oriented Germany, instead of Germany that dominated Europe.