2023-12-23 19:50:34
The grave of former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and his wife Loki in Hamburg (North) was vandalized with swastika paintings, according to police, an act described as “odious” on Saturday by the Minister of the Interior .
“The red-painted swastikas were discovered on Friday evening on their grave in a Hamburg cemetery and could be immediately erased,” Hamburg police said.
The police currently have no information on the identity of the person or people who allegedly vandalized the grave, nor on the motivations. The investigation continues.
An act “which forgets History”
The German Minister of the Interior, Nancy Faeser, a member of the Social Democratic Party like Helmut Schmidt, strongly condemned this “odious act, which forgets History”.
What a despicable and historically forgotten act. Helmut and Loki Schmidt always stood up against inhumanity, racism and anti-Semitism – aware of our history. https://t.co/dPBUuZAmKy
— Nancy Faeser (@NancyFaeser) December 23, 2023
“Helmut and Loki Schmidt have always opposed contempt for man, racism and anti-Semitism – aware of our History,” she said on X, formerly Twitter.
“This senseless vandalism constitutes above all a massive attempt to harm the memory of the two people who found their final resting place at the Ohlsdorf cemetery in Hamburg,” reacts, for its part, the foundation for Chancellor Helmut Schmidt. “Loki and Helmut Schmidt have always campaigned for freedom, democracy and international understanding. They resolutely rejected inhumane tyranny and anti-Semitism,” she continues.
Born in Hamburg on December 23, 1918, Social Democrat Helmut Schmidt would have been 105 years old on Saturday. Died on November 10, 2015, he led West Germany from 1974 to 1982, when the country became a global economic power.
A convinced European who embodied “Realpolitik” during the Cold War, he initiated a new economic liberalism within German social democracy.
#Germany #grave #exchancellor #Helmut #Schmidt #vandalized #swastikas