Late German politician Schäuble hailed as European statesman

Dignitaries and politicians bid farewell to the late German lawmaker Wolfgang Schäuble in a state ceremony in Germany's parliament, the Bundestag, on Monday.

French President Emmanuel Macron hailed Schäuble in a eulogy, saying that "Germany has lost a statesman, Europe has lost a pillar, France has lost a friend."

Macron also evoked the recent death of Jacques Delors, a former president of the European Commission who died a day after Schäuble.

"One after the other, Europe has lost two of its great visionaries," said Macron, who gave the speech in German. He called both Schäuble and Delors founding fathers of European reconciliation and unification. "Two statesmen who gave everything for their countries and for Europe."

Chancellor Olaf Scholz, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Bundestag President Bärbel Bas were also among the prominent leaders at the ceremony.

Around 1,500 people attended the ceremony, which was preceded by a memorial service at Berlin Cathedral.

Schäuble's family and other prominent German politicians, including former chancellor Angela Merkel, also attended.

Schäuble, who survived an assassination attempt in 1990, served in the German parliament with the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) for a record 51 years from 1972 until his death on December 26.

He also held several ministerial posts. He led negotiations over German reunification as West Germany's interior minister under former chancellor Helmut Kohl, and pressed for austerity measures during the eurozone crisis as finance minister under Merkel.

In his final years, Schäuble served as a simple CDU backbencher. He died at the age of 81 in his home city of Offenburg in south-west Germany, which he represented in parliament for more than half of his life, and has since been buried there.

Bärbel noted that Schäuble long placed particular importance on Germany's reconciliation and friendship with France after a painful and bloody history of invasions by German forces, including during World War II.

Friedrich Merz, the current CDU chairman, hailed Schäuble's long career and his commitment to German democracy, Franco-German friendship and European cooperation.

"We pay tribute to a true statesman of our country, to a European statesman, to a pugnacious democrat, to a formative personality in the recent history of our country," Merz said. "Thank you, Wolfgang Schäuble."

Merz acknowledged that Schäuble's tough approach to negotiations didn't always win him friends and admiration, such as during the eurozone crisis, when Schäuble was widely vilified in Greece for insisting on painful government budget cuts.

"But his dealings were always fair, he was always willing to listen respectfully to his counterpart and was always prepared to make compromises in the interests of Europe," Merz said.