Trust cannot be commanded; and yet it is also correct that the only one who earns trust is the one who is prepared to grant trust.

The time has come - and must come - for multilateral conversations about a secure peace in all of Europe.

We have to recognize that the freedom of the individual has to be protected not only from the power of the state, but even more so from economic and societal power.

War is not the quintessential emergency in which man has to prove himself, as my generation learned at its school desks in the days of the Kaiser; rather, peace is the emergency in which we all have to prove ourselves.

Some fatherlands are difficult. Germany is one of them. But it is our fatherland. Here is where we live and work.

Everywhere, authority and tradition have to justify themselves in the face of questions.

Beyond peace, there is no longer any existence possible.