Nationwide commemoration of Remembrance Day - also in the Bundestag

Remembrance Day Remembrance - and a Call for Compassion As of: November 15, 2026 • 4:24 p.m

Remembrance Day is not a public holiday, but is a national day of remembrance. War victims are remembered across the country today. This year together with the Austrian Federal President Van der Bellen. He called for more compassion.

Wreath-laying and a memorial hour in the Bundestag - on Remembrance Day, the victims of war and violence are remembered. There were commemorative events in cemeteries or memorial sites across the country. Remembrance Day was also a topic in church services.

The Federal Presidents of Germany and Austria, Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Alexander Van der Bellen, together with their wives Elke Büdenbender and Doris Schmidauer laid a wreath at the Neue Wache in Berlin.

In addition to the two heads of state, President of the Bundestag Julia Klöckner, President of the Federal Council Hendrik Wüst and the President of the Federal Constitutional Court, Stephan Harbarth, also came to lay the wreath. Chancellor Friedrich Merz was represented by Defense Minister Boris Pistorius.

Federal President Steinmeier also spoke at the memorial hour in the Bundestag.

This was followed by a memorial hour in the Bundestag. There, Van der Bellen called for Europe to be a place of peace, freedom and human dignity. The basis for this is also to maintain compassion for other suffering people. “Compassion is not a weakness, it is a human strength, it is the foundation of humanity.”

Klöckner called on society to work for a robust democracy. Remembrance Day is a reminder of how devastating tyranny and disregard for human dignity are, she told the dpa news agency. "Democracy is the antidote here. But it is not an heirloom. It will wither away if we do not keep fulfilling its promise of basic rights and freedom."

The President of the Volksbund, General a. D. Wolfgang Schneiderhan, recalled the “still not healed wounds” of the Second World War. The “unthinkable” that another war could occur after the Second World War has become reality, said Schneiderhan. To prevent this, he relies on the EU, which is often criticized in day-to-day politics: "But the states involved have achieved an extraordinary amount of success here. 27 countries have linked their fates with one another and have thus created the basis for reconciliation, which seemed very far away after the Second World War."

“We take young people to the places of history,” said the former Inspector General of the Bundeswehr, referring to the work of the Volksbund. "We want them to learn from what people do to other people. We hope that they learn to appreciate the value of peace. That they stand up to hate and hate speech, because that's where so many bad things start."

Schneiderhan also pointed out declining donations in the Rheinische Post. This caused problems with the maintenance of memorials abroad. He called for more government funding “to close this gap.”

This topic in the program: The First | daily news | 11/15/2026 | 2:00 p.m