Mattarella is in Berlin, tonight the informal meeting with Steinmeier

Sergio Mattarella has arrived in Berlin, accompanied by his daughter Laura and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani for a state visit to Germany. The President of the Republic’s first stop will be the dinner offered this evening to him and his daughter by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his wife Elke.

Official talks between the presidents and their respective delegations will take place on Friday morning, with a joint press conference scheduled for 10.40am. Immediately afterwards Mattarella will see the president of the Bundestag, Barbel Bas, the mayor of Berlin, Kai Wegner, and the German chancellor, Scholz. In the evening the state dinner will be held at Palazzo Bellevue. On Saturday 28th Steinmeier and Mattarella will move to Bonn, to participate and conclude the seminar ‘Cooperation between Italy and Germany: a precious asset for the UNFCCC and for the fight against climate change’ at the United Nations Campus.

A crucial seminar to underline the role of energy hub in the Mediterranean that Berlin attributes to Rome. Mattarella will then meet the vice-minister president of the Land of North Rhine-Westphalia, Mona Neubaur and the minister president of the Land of North Rhine-Westphalia, Hendrik Wuest. In the afternoon he will be in Cologne for a visit to the cathedral and for a final dinner in the Botanical Garden, always accompanied by Steinmeier.

On the morning of Sunday 29th, the two presidents will leave together for Bologna, to participate in the ceremony in Marzabotto for the 80th anniversary of the Monte Sole massacre: a new stage in the journey of shared memory of the years of Nazi-fascism and the racial laws. For Mattarella and Steinmeier this is the third visit to the sites of the Nazi-fascist massacres, after those at the Fosse Ardeatine and Fivizzano; before them Carlo Azeglio Ciampi and Johannes Rau had gone together with Marzabotto and Giorgio Napolitano and Joachim Gauck to Sant’Anna di Stazzema.