Excellencies, colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen, Dear Guests,

A warm welcome to all of you on the occasion of the celebration of the Day of German Unity! Thank you for having made the long way to Janzour and for spending the evening with us.

On this particular occasion, on the Day of German Unity, we commemorate the unification of Germany which occurred 35 years ago, on the 3rd of October 1990.

German unification took place in an inspiring Era of European and World history. After decades of division and mistrust during the Cold War, the world was finally coming together again. International cooperation on a grand scale was at the order of the day. We were out there to build a better, more peaceful world for everyone. The States in Eastern Europe and the Baltics acquired their independence. Europe grew together again. The foundations for the enlargement of the European Union and NATO to include 12 new Eastern European Members were laid. In the Security Council of the United Nations, long-standing conflicts that had fallen prey to the polarization of the Cold War were addressed. Most prominently amongst them the Israeli – Palestinian conflict. The Madrid Conference took place in 1991. The Oslo Accords were signed in 1993. The International Criminal Court was created. Ideological confrontation seemed to have been overcome for good. Francis Fukuyama wrote about „The End of History“. Liberal democracies, the rule of law and free markets seemed to be the final destination of all political aspirations.

Then came 9/11. On the 11th of September 2001, civilian planes crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The next day, we woke up to a new world. US-led wars in Afghanistan and Irak and the Global War on Terror followed. Gone was the notion of an „End of History“. It was replaced by the dark, dystopian vision of Sam Huntington‘s „Clash of Civilizations“.

A decade after 9/11, in 2011, the Arab Streets began mobilizing. You know the story. Eventually, the „Arab Spring“ turned into an „Arab Winter“. The aspirations of many of the Arab people for regime change and a better life remained unfulfilled. In Libya, Gaddafi was overthrown in Summer 2011. Libya subsequently descended into armed conflict and strife and has remained in a fragmented and fragile state ever since.

Today, we find ourselves in a different Era again. In 2020, Covid disrupted international trade and the divison of labor at the core of global economics. The wars against Ukraine and Gaza have eroded the confidence in a just and equitable international order based on the respect for international law. Our societies are increasingly polarized. Social Media, boosted by Artificial Intelligence, feed and exploit division and strife. Migration flows fuel identity politics. We see an unprecedented accumulation of wealth, knowledge and power in the hands of a few. Feelings of loss of control and loss of agency are widespread, and not without reason. Guiliano da Empoli calls our times „The Hour of the Predator“, where autocrats and tech billionaires are taking over the world.

Four distinct Eras in the last 40 years, each one lasting for a decade, each one with its particular features, characteristics, challenges and opportunities.

joined the German Foreign Service in 1991, a year after German Unification. I have served as a German and European Diplomat ever since, in a career focused on the relationship between Europe and its Arab neighbors.

I still carry the enthusiasm and hopes of the 90s inside me, when the sky was the limit. The aberrations of the Global War on Terror are still etched in my memory. And I still relate to the aspirations of the people in the Arab Spring and their deception when they got outmaneuvered by politics.

Having gone through all of this, I ask myself the question today: How do we revive the spirit of the 90s, powerfully symbolized by the fall of the Berlin Wall, work together for a more cooperative and peaceful world, in an Era of Predators and transactional politics?

Looking at Libya today, the lessons of the 1990s give me hope that Libya can get out of its currently fragile state. It can be done. But Libyan reunification and the reconstitution of the political space in Libya will not be an easy task. In the current context, the temptation runs high to continue to muddle through, or to go for quick fixes. But as much as muddling through or quick fixes might provide some instant relief, they will not lead to stability. And they will not deliver on Libya's capacity of sovereign decision-making, nor on improved governance, nor on equitable life opportunities for the people of Libya.

But this precisely – first: reclaiming Libya's capacity of sovereign decision-making, second: improving governance and third: promoting equitable life opportunities for the people of Libya - should be the level of our collective ambition for Libya. This will require a sound political process, leadership and determination. The major stakeholders inside and outside of Libya will have to pull in the same direction and agree on a vision for the country. This cannot be imposed. It can only be achieved through a truly inclusive political process.

The gathering place for our collective efforts to improve the political, economic, security and human rights situation in Libya are the United Nations. The UN Mission in Libya is probably the sole actor in Libya with universal convening power, inside and outside of Libya. It presented, after broad consultations with stakeholders, a roadmap for a Libyan owned and Libyan led political process facilitated by the UN, which is currently being rolled out step by step.

Allow me to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the team of UNSMIL under the leadership of Hanna Tetteh, for the political vision they have formulated for the country and for the courage and commitment of their dedicated staff.

I am aware that not everyone agrees with all the details and some of the sequencing of UNSMIL's political Roadmap. However, it is at this juncture the only credible blueprint to address the challenges in Libya in a holistic manner. It binds all the threads together – politics,
security, economy, and the respect for human rights and basic freedoms. It found the backing of the UN Security Council and sufficient buy-in from internal and external actors in order to move forward. It deserves all the support we can give.

It is in this spirit that Germany organised the meeting at Senior Officials' level of the International Follow up Conference on Libya of the Berlin Process on the 20th of June of this year in Berlin. This gathering brought together the international stakeholders connected to the Libya file with the aim to align our understanding of the situation in Libya, to discuss what needs to be done and to express our collective support for UNSMIL's efforts. Libya was represented at the conference table as well at Senior Officials' level. This was a major step forward in engaging the international community on Libya, in an inclusive format which brought together its key actors and which had been missing ever since the Berlin Process went silent in January 2022.

The IFCL meeting in Berlin was followed by meetings held in Tripoli to reinvigorate the 4 Working Groups of the Berlin Process - Political, Security, Economy and Human Rights, at Ambassador's level. We intend to continue to meet in that format. Our common work has only just begun.

Supporting UNSMIL in implementing its roadmap through reinvigorating the Berlin Process has been a centerpiece of our political work at the German Embassy in Tripoli in the course of the last year. But Germany’s and the German Embassy’s engagement with Libya certainly goes way beyond this contribution. My team and I worked with Libyan counterparts on migration-related issues, on supporting local elections, on capacity building in municipalities, on supporting independent oversight bodies, on promoting economic and business ties between our two countries, on exploring options to engage in renewable energies, on projects to empower women and youth, on implementing cultural projects, and many other projects.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all Libyan counterparts who have engaged with us in those projects, and who like us work towards a better future for Libya and the Libyans.

I would equally like to thank all our partners and colleagues in the international community for their partnership and their dedication to our common cause. In this place where most of us diplomats and expatriates cannot live together with their families, you have been more to me than just partners at work.

Last but not least, I would also like to thank wholeheartedly my small, but fabulous team at the German Embassy in Tripoli and Tunis for their outstanding commitment, dedication, team spirit, sense of duty and, most importantly, sense of humor which has made all the difference in working and living in Libya. Thank you