Overview

• He warned that “free-hostile fundamental currents” in the four largest global powers threaten to erode freedoms in science and the arts.
• He singled out the United States and India as democracies where nationalist movements are taking on repressive traits.
• Ordenskanzler Hermann Parzinger cautioned that right-wing forces in Germany are launching a “cultural struggle from the right” against municipal and state cultural institutions.
• Parzinger warned that concerning developments have emerged not only in East Germany but also in West German areas such as North Hesse and the Ruhrgebiet.
• The Orden Pour le mérite, founded in the 19th century by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV and now under President Steinmeier’s patronage, comprises about 80 distinguished figures, including many Nobel laureates.