The decision of the city of Berlin not to illuminate the Brandenburg Gate, its most famous monument, with the colors of the Russian flag as a sign of solidarity after the bombing in St. Petersburg has caused outrage. In fact, her critics described the decision as "scandalous".
In the past, after attacks in other countries, the Gate has been "painted" with the colors of the French, Turkish, British and Dutch flags. However, a city council spokesman said the mayor had decided that this would only happen when attacks on "twinned towns" took place. St. Petersburg is not one of them.
Critics of the mayor recalled that the Brandenburg Gate was illuminated in the colors of the rainbow last year when a gunman killed 49 people inside a gay bar in Orlando, Florida. The same thing happened after an attack in Jerusalem, when it was "painted" with the flag of Israel. Neither Orlando nor Jerusalem are "twinned" with Berlin.
Although the Eiffel Tower in Paris turned off its lights, in memory of the victims of St. Petersburg, many other European monuments remained illuminated as usual.
The head of the Russian service of Deutsche Welle, Ingo Mandoifel, said that this decision underestimates the victims of St. Petersburg, even at a time when the German government maintains that it values the Russian people even if it disagrees with the Kremlin. The West "has a moral and political duty to show solidarity with the victims of terrorism in Russia. "Therefore, it was wrong not to illuminate the Brandenburg Gate with Russian colors, yes, it was a scandal," he wrote.
Andreas Petzold, the publisher of Stern magazine, described the Berlin leaders as "narrow-minded" in a Twitter message, as reported by Reuters and relayed by the Athens News Agency.
The German government's relations with Moscow deteriorated when Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and became even more complicated after Russia's involvement in the war in Syria.
Source: Newsbeast