Our relations with Poland are very important to me. I have personally invested a lot in them over the decades.

I am travelling to Warsaw on the understanding that I am visiting friends, partners and good neighbours. Especially now, a quarter of a century after the lifting of the Iron Curtain and the German‑Polish Treaty on Good‑Neighbourliness, we should look towards the future together, aware of our responsibility and the burdens of history.

At a time when the matters to be dealt with are difficult and highly sensitive, it is all the more important never to break off communication and to talk to rather than about one another.