Brussels / Luxembourg, 25/06/2002 (Agence Europe) - Luxembourg's Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker paid tribute, on 24 June, to the former Prime Minister and former Finance Minister, Pierre Werner, who was the author of the 1970 Plan on the European Monetary Union. Mr Juncker has died, aged 88. This "great architect of post-war Europe" "was not able to live through the introduction of the euro in every detail" but, on 1 January last, "he was in our thoughts" as one of the fathers of single currency, and it is good that he could see it happen, said Mr Juncker.
European Commission President Romano Prodi felt that the Werner Plan, conceived "over thirty years before the euro filled the purses of hundred of millions of citizens, remains a model of vision and genius". He was one of those Statesmen who are "able to see further than the contingencies of the moment and to anticipate the great changes that Europe was to begin", said Mr Prodi.
Hans-Gert Pöttering, President of the EPP-ED Group at the European Parliament, noted that Pierre Werner was a man who was well ahead of his time, and that, with his passing away, the European Christian Democrats "lose one of their fathers".