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President Klaus Iohannis will participate on Friday in the "Charlemagne Prize Europa Summit" videoconference, organized by the Society for the Conferring of the International "Charlemagne" Prize of Aachen, according to AGERPRES.
On this occasion, the head of state will deliver the keynote address at the panel entitled "Overcoming Discrepancies within the European Union".
According to the Presidential Administration, the event will be attended by senior German and European officials, former laureates of the "Charlemagne" international award, along with analysts, journalists and business representatives.
The Charlemagne International Prize is awarded annually in the city of Aachen to public figures or organizations that have distinguished themselves by their special involvement in favor of European unity or cooperation between member states. The award is given in memory of Emperor Charlemagne, the founder of the Carolingian Empire, the first recognized emperor in Western Europe after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, who ruled and was buried in Aachen.
President Iohannis is the 2020 winner of the International Charlemagne Prize. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the award ceremony, originally scheduled for May 21, 2020, has been postponed to May 13, 2021, in Aachen.
On the list of laureates are the founding fathers of the European Community, the architects of the modern European Union and the representatives of the democratic movements in Central and Eastern Europe. Notable personalities who have received this award include Winston Churchill, Henry Kissinger, Vaclav Havel, Jean-Claude Juncker, Angela Merkel, Donald Tusk, Herman Van Rompuy, Martin Schulz, Pope Francis, Simone Veil, King Juan Carlos of Spain or Pope John Paul II, who received, in 2004, the only Extraordinary "Charlemagne" Prize to date. The most recent two winners were the President of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, in 2018, and the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, in 2019.
