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Horst Teltschik diary

Cold War: Horst Teltschik diary (Kohl at European Council finds MT cool) [translation]

Document type: Declassified documents
Source: Horst Teltschik, 329 Tage: Innenansichten der Einigung [329 Days: Inside Views of the Unification] , Siedler Publishing 1991
Editorial comments: Translated specially for www.margaretthatcher.org. Dr Teltschik was Helmut Kohl’s closest foreign policy adviser.
Importance ranking: Major
Word count: 105
Themes: Defence (general), Foreign policy (USA), Foreign policy (USSR & successor states), Foreign policy (Western Europe - non-EU)

Saturday, 18 November 1989

The Federal Chancellor has not raised the topic of re-unification at the EC Summit, in order to avoid giving an opportunity for EC partners, who bear no responsibility “in and for Germany”, to restrict through a discussion his room for manoeuvre in negotiations. He therefore merely gave a detailed report of the events of the last week in the GDR and how he assesses their further development. Later he tells me that Mitterrand, Gonzalez, Santer and Martens behaved in a very friendly fashion. By contrast, the Greek and Portuguese Prime Ministers were concerned above all with the Mediterranean programme. Thatcher and Lubbers appeared decidedly cool.