Helmut Kohl died on 16 June 2017 and was survived by his sons Walter Kohl and Peter Kohl, and grandchildren Johannes Volkmann and Leyla Kohl. The European Commission announced that it was planning a grand ceremony, attended by European heads of state and government, to honour Kohl. Kohl was one of only three people to be awarded the title Honorary Citizen of Europe by the European Union, and was, together with French President François Mitterrand, one of the two principal architects of the Maastricht Treaty which established the European Union and the euro currency. He was also considered the "father of the German reunification."[1][2][3]
No member of the Kohl family, Kohl's children and grandchildren, attended the ceremony, owing to a feud with Kohl's controversial second wife Maike Kohl-Richter, who had among other things barred them from paying their respects to their father and grandfather after his death, ignored their wish for a ceremony in Berlin and their wish that Kohl should be interred alongside his parents and his wife of four decades Hannelore Kohl in the family tomb.[8] Richter had also attempted to bar Chancellor Merkel from speaking and wanted to have Viktor Orbán, who has fiercely criticized Merkel's refugee policy, speak instead.[9]
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