Klaus Bölling

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Klaus Bölling, 1980

Klaus Bölling (born August 29, 1928 in Potsdam ; † November 1, 2014 in Berlin ) was a German publicist . He became known through his many years of activity as government spokesman for the social-liberal coalition government from 1974 to 1982 ( Schmidt I , II and III cabinet ; with one interruption from February 1981 to May 1982).

Life

Klaus Bölling was born the son of a Prussian civil servant. His father, an administrative lawyer in Gumbinnen , Tilsit and Oppeln, was a member of Hans Zehrer's “ Tatkreis ” from 1929 to 1933 . He was dismissed from civil service by the Nazi regime and later repeatedly subjected to interrogation by the Gestapo . Bölling was Protestant. His mother was of Jewish descent and was deported to Auschwitz concentration camp in 1944 . She survived seriously ill.

Bölling attended high school in Berlin-Zehlendorf . In 1944 he was deployed as a flak helper , but - after his mother was arrested - dismissed as "unworthy of defense". After graduating from high school, he studied history and German at the Humboldt University in East Berlin without a degree. Under the influence of his parents' fate, he temporarily joined the KPD in 1945 at the age of 17 and was then editor of an East Berlin FDJ newspaper ; In 1947 he left the SED disappointed . Impressed by Herbert Wehner , he joined the SPD in 1958 .

From 1947 Bölling worked as an editor at the West Berlin Tagesspiegel . He then became a political editor and commentator at RIAS . Then he went to WDR and in 1963 developed together with Gerd Ruge the ARD program Weltspiegel , which is still running today and of which he was temporarily presenter. Between 1969 and 1973 he headed the ARD studio in Washington, DC , and from 1973 to 1974 he was director of Radio Bremen .

Klaus Bölling (center) as permanent representative in the GDR with Erich Honecker (1981)

In 1974, under Federal Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, Bölling became government spokesman and head of the federal press office as a permanent state secretary . During the hijacking of the Lufthansa plane Landshut to Mogadishu in 1977, he was the contact person for the hijackers. On February 9, 1981, he succeeded Günter Gaus as permanent representative of the Federal Republic of the GDR . On May 24, 1982, Bölling returned to Bonn as government spokesman, which he held until the end of the social-liberal coalition (October 1982).

Since then he has worked as a publicist in Berlin. He is buried in the Dahlem forest cemetery in Berlin.

Honors

Publications

Web links

Commons : Klaus Bölling  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Klaus Bölling is dead , Süddeutsche Zeitung , November 8, 2014, p. 32
  2. ^ Ex-government spokesman Klaus Bölling is dead , Der Spiegel, November 2, 2014
  3. ↑ Interview Zeitwende from: Vorwärts; Edition 06/2008 ( Memento of November 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
  4. ↑ Klaus Bölling , Internationales Biographisches Archiv 31/2009 from July 28, 2009 (rw), supplemented by news from MA-Journal up to week 45/2014, in the Munzinger archive , accessed on November 11, 2014 ( beginning of the article freely available)
  5. ^ The Schmidt III cabinet ended on October 1, 1982 with the constructive vote of no confidence
  6. ↑ Fried Park: Forest Cemetery Dahlem
  7. ↑ Announcement of awards of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. In: Federal Gazette . Vol. 30, No. 219, November 21, 1978.
  8. ↑ List of all decorations awarded by the Federal President for services to the Republic of Austria from 1952 (PDF; 6.9 MB)
personal data
SURNAME Bölling, Klaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German publicist
DATE OF BIRTH August 29, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Potsdam
DATE OF DEATH November 1, 2014
Place of death Berlin