Von der Leyen to receive Charlemagne prize for European unification

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BRUSSELS – European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will receive the Charlemagne Prize for services to European unification, the board of directors for the award announced on Wednesday.

The Charlemagne Prize is awarded annually by the City of Aachen in the north-western German state of North-Rhine Westphalia, and is named after the early-medieval Frankish King who established what became the Holy Roman Empire.

The official citation for the prize says von der Leyen “personifies Europe” and called her “the powerful voice of Europe on the world’s stage.” It mentions her leadership of the Commission during the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The announcement comes as the von der Leyen Commission is under fire for concealing the fact she was hospitalised for around a week at the start of this month. On Tuesday the EU executive refused to apologise for the secrecy.

Von der Leyen will be the prize’s 75th recipient, as well as the third Commission president to receive the award, after Roy Jenkins in 1972 and Jacques Delors in 1992.

However, the European Commission itself won the prize in 1969, and the Euro single currency won it in 2002.

Other past winners include Germany’s first post-war chancellor Konrad Adenauer, Winston Churchill, US Secretary of State George Marshall, King Juan Carlos of Spain, Britain’s former prime minister Tony Blair, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The prize is traditionally awarded at Aachen City Hall on Ascension Day, which this year falls on 29 May. Euractiv has asked the European Commission whether von der Leyen will be in Aachen on that day to receive the award.

[Edited by Owen Morgan]





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