Apel upsets the cart

Press, 30 August 1984, Page 21

Apel upsets the cart

Against the background of steadily improving relations between the two Germanies, one of the most sacred of sacred cows of West German policy is being called into question. It is the issue of reunification, enshrined in the West German constitution as a national goal and spoken of by Chancellor Helmut Kohl almost as a holy duty.

Until now, only the radical Greens have publicly expressed any doubts as to whether it is a realistic — or even useful — policy. But the Greens are still rarely taken seriously, and it usually needs a considerable time for their ideas to filter through into the wider political consciousness. Now the political establishment has been shocked to hear a senior Opposition Social Democrat politician, the former Finance and Defence Minister, Hans Apel, apparently uttering similar sentiments in a /adio interview mafSjpg the 23rd anhiversary of the building of the Berlin Wall.

“The German question is no

From

longer open,” Mr Apel said. “In Deutschland Politik one must proceed from the fact that two German States exist.”

Showing he has not gone completely “Green”, he added the ritual formula that, of course, the reunification imperative as stated in the constitution was still valid, although it could be fulfilled only in the long term and through European union. That, however, is exactly the position of the present Government, as stated in a number of speeches both at home and abroad by ministers and Chancellor Kohl himself.

So why the shock and outrage expressed by Government members and conservative commentators, and mutterings of unease by some of Mr zfcel’s own S.P.D. colleagues? 'iy

The Minister of State in the Foreign Office, Alois Mertes, inter-

TONY CATTERALL,

in Bonn

viewed by the conservative Die Welt, branded the comments as “factually incorrect and politically irresponsible.”

A commentator in the same newspaper, noting Mr Apel had not been disowned by either the leader of the opposition, Hans-Jochen Vogel, or the SPD chairman, Willy Brandt, said it called into doubt the party’s “reliability on the national question.”

The reason is that no Bonn Government — especially a conservative Government — can afford to admit that improved economic conditions in East Germany make the East Berlin regime more secure. Even though Bonn politicians do talk of unification as something for the long term, they also need somehow to give the popular impression Wj.at it is just around the corner.

Mr Apel’s statement upsets that balancing act.