Rüdiger von Wechmar

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Rüdiger Freiherr von Wechmar (born November 15, 1923 in Berlin ; † October 17, 2007 in Munich ) was a German journalist and diplomat , and in the 1970s the ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United Nations .

Life and work

Rüdiger von Wechmar, the only son of the professional officer Irnfried von Wechmar and his wife Ilse von Binzer. von Trotha (1895–1980), grew up in Berlin-Südende . The family has its origins in Wechmar, Thuringia . Following the family tradition, he did military training in a Napola , the National Socialist equivalent of the cadet schools in imperial times. As a 17-year-old with a secondary school diploma , von Wechmar volunteered for the Wehrmacht in 1941 and was deployed for two years in the Africa Corps under General Field Marshal Rommel , in the regiment that his father had recently led. He was brought to the United States as a prisoner of war . During this time he was one of 500,000 German prisoners there. During his three-and-a-half year captivity, he took a correspondence course in journalism at the University of Minnesota through the agency of the US YMCA .

Back in Germany, he began a career as a journalist, initially at the UPI press agency , for which he reported about the Nuremberg trials . In 1950 he was one of the founders of the federal press conference in Bonn .

In 1958 he joined the Foreign Service as a press officer at the Consulate General in New York . In New York he was also a member of the Permanent Observer Mission to the United Nations.

With the support of his friend Walter Cronkite , he got to know the television business at CBS Evening News in the USA . In 1963 he resigned from the diplomatic service to become foreign correspondent for Eastern Europe for the newly founded Second German Television (ZDF) in Vienna . In 1968 he became a civil servant again, first as director of the German Information Center in New York, then in 1969 under Conrad Ahler's deputy government spokesman.

In 1973 von Wechmar was appointed government spokesman with the rank of permanent state secretary and remained his government spokesman until the end of Chancellor Willy Brandt's term of office , until he became permanent representative of the Federal Republic to the United Nations in 1974. He represented the Federal Republic of Germany in the UN Security Council in 1977 and 1978 , also as its President for two months. 1980/1981 he was chairman of the UN General Assembly .

1981 to 1983 he was ambassador to Rome, 1983 to 1988 Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany in London . In 1988 he was elected to the European Parliament as a “draft horse” for the FDP . After five years of abstinence, the Free Democrats were able to return to the European Parliament for one legislative period in 1989.

From 1971 to 1973 and from 1982 to 1990 he was a member of the Advisory Board of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation .

Rüdiger von Wechmar was married twice. In 1947 he married Rosemarie Warlimont , with whom he had two children. In 1958 the couple separated. In New York he met Susanne Woldenga , the daughter of the fighter pilot Bernhard Woldenga , married her and had a child with her. He last lived in Munich. The 83-year-old died in a hospital as a result of a stroke .

MP

From 1989 to 1994 von Wechmar was a member of the European Parliament for the FDP and chairman of the German group in the Liberal Fraction (ELDE). In the election for President of the European Parliament he received in the session of July 25, 1989 of six candidates with 93 votes, the second best result, but had to admit defeat to the Social Democrat Enrique Barón Crespo .

Honors

Others

  • Wechmar was the first citizen of the Federal Republic of Germany to receive a passport . The passport was issued on February 14, 1951 and bore the number one. In the 1990s it was exhibited in the House of History in Bonn .

literature

  • Rüdiger Wechmar: Actor in the box. Worldly memories . Siedler Verlag, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-88680-692-8 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Interview with Jürgen Martin Möller, broadcast by Bayerischer Rundfunk on May 14, 1999 ( Memento from January 31, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 39 kB)
  2. ^ Rüdiger von Wechmar: Akteur in der Loge , Siedler, Munich 2000, here p. 106.
  3. ^ Rüdiger von Wechmar: Akteur in der Loge , Siedler, Munich 2000, here p. 211.
  4. ^ Rüdiger von Wechmar: Akteur in der Loge , Siedler, Munich 2000, here p. 222.
  5. ↑ http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=IM-PRESS&reference=20090616BKG57210&language=SV#title3
  6. ^ Rüdiger von Wechmar: Actor in the Loge , Siedler, Munich 2000, here pp. 141–143.
predecessor Office successor
Walter Gehlhoff Permanent representative of Germany to the United Nations
1974–1981 		Günther van Well
personal data
SURNAME Wechmar, Rüdiger von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Wechmar, Rüdiger Freiherr von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (FDP), MEP, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United Nations
DATE OF BIRTH November 15, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH October 17, 2007
Place of death Munich