Berlin, 8 November 2014 With journalists, partners and business associates from around the world, visitBerlin is celebrating a quarter century since the fall of the Berlin Wall with a gala dinner at Berlin’s Bode Museum. The fall of the Wall and the subsequent reunification of the city is largely responsible for the city’s rapid return to world prominence as a tourist destination and a place to do business. The guests include some 120 leaders in the international travel and convention industry, CEOs of airlines, and journalists from leading media outlets in Europe, the USA, Israel, Russia and the United Arab Emirates. They have all helped to bring international attention back to Berlin.

Burkhard Kieker, CEO of visitBerlin comments, “On this very special, emotional day, we’re taking a look back with our friends and partners and seeing how the people of Berlin have taken advantage of this unique historic opportunity. We are particularly proud some of the unsung heroes of the revolution in East Germany are among us. We have so much to thank them for.”

The contemporary witnesses Frank Ebert, Tom Sello, Dr Olaf Weissbach and Christopher Ochs from the Robert-Havemann-Gesellschaft are available for questions of the international guests. The speakers will include civil rights activist and the last foreign minister of the newly democratic East Germany, Markus Meckel, and journalist Peter Brinkmann, who will speak about the days leading up to the Wall’s opening. visitBerlin’s CEO Burkhard Kieker and CEO of Kulturprojekte Berlin Moritz van Dülmen are receiving their guests of honour jointly. Star chefs Daniel Achilles and Tim Raue have compiled an East-West menu for the dinner on Berlin’s Museum Island.

The Berlin Senate is prominently represented by Mayors Senators Frank Henkel and Michael Müller, the Senator for Justice Thomas Heilmann and Björn Böhning, head of the Senate Chancellery. The guests also include Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, British singer Peter Gabriel and US astronaut Ron Garan. The international guests are spending three days in the German capital and will take part in the celebrations at the Brandenburg Gate.