WARSAW, Poland - Germany's president paid tribute Tuesday to Polish victims of Nazi atrocities during World War II with ceremonies at memorials commemorating resistance to wartime German occupation, and postwar reconciliation.
Christian Wulff's visit to Warsaw came 40 years after then West German Chancellor Willy Brandt spontaneously sank to his knees at a memorial to the doomed insurgents of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943. That dramatic gesture of humility over Nazi crimes on Dec. 7, 1970, marked a key turning point in postwar reconciliation between Poland and Germany.
Wulff recalled in a speech that it also helped rehabilitate his nation's image on the world stage.
"Thus an image of another Germany developed, another Germany of freedom, democracy and a peaceloving Germany that seeks harmony with its neighbours," he said.
Wulff laid a wreath at that same memorial in the heart of the former Warsaw Ghetto, bowing his head before the dark granite monument. He also placed flowers at a bronze plaque on the same vast square that honours Brandt. It depicts the late German statesman kneeling in his famous gesture.
Wulff recalled being only 11 years old at the time of Brandt's gesture of remorse, saying "it impressed me deeply."
Wulff also visited the memorial to the Warsaw Uprising, a revolt against the German occupation by the entire city in 1944 that ended tragically for the insurgents.