Mayor of Paris, Minister and Prime Minister several times, Member of the European Parliament and President of the French Republic from 1995 to 2007, Jacques Chirac passed away on Thursday 26 September at the age of 86. Throughout the day, tributes have proliferated to celebrate his memory and his European commitment.
On Twitter, the President-elect of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said she was deeply saddened by the death of the man she considers to be “a great leader, a great European and a man who has inspired a whole generation. We must strive to honour his heritage by building a stronger and more united Union”, she said.
“We were together for the birth of the euro. I remember the endless nights of working together on the future of Europe during the Nice Conference. He was a pragmatic European, who always knew how to defend a certain idea of Europe. He had defended the ‘yes’ to the 1992 referendum on the Maastricht Treaty and supported the major enlargement in 2004”, recalled the current President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, in a statement.
Like President Juncker, the European leaders who paid tribute to him remember above all his ‘no’ vote in 2003 on the war in Iraq, his speech at the Velodrome d'Hiver in 1995, which called for lessons to be learned from history and his commitment to the fight against climate change.
“France and Europe are losing a major figure”, regretted the President-elect of the European Council and Belgian Prime Minister, Charles Michel. In the eyes of Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, he was a “committed champion of European integration”, while for German Chancellor Angela Merkel, he was above all “an outstanding partner and friend” to Germany. For his part, Russian President Vladimir Putin paid tribute to a “wise and visionary leader”. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)