In the evening around 3500 Berliners gathered at the Brandenburg Gate. Out of solidarity with the people of Ukraine and against the war. The State Music Council, the Presidium of the Berlin Choir Association and other music associations called for people to sing and make music together for peace.
According to the website of the Landesmusikrat Berlin, they are “dismayed by the Russian military attack on Ukraine”.
The three-part church canon “Dona nobis pacem” (Give us peace), the “Ode to Joy”, which was spontaneously rewritten as “Peace, beautiful spark of the gods” (instead of joy), “Imagine” by John Lennon and “Tell me where the flowers are”.
Tanja Kurylenko (26) from Charlottenburg was also there. The Ukrainian student has been living in Berlin for three years and is very worried about her parents: “My family fled Kiev a few hours ago. Somewhere in the country. Your neighbors have all disappeared from the face of the earth too, I feel so helpless because I can’t do anything. That’s why I’m taking to the streets here in Germany and calling on Germany and the West to finally do something. Something that really helps my family.”
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Svitlana Förster (47) from Lichtenberg: “I’m standing here on Pariser Platz to fight for peace. I was here yesterday and will be back tomorrow. My thoughts are with friends and family in western Ukraine. Ukraine is such a small country, all my friends feel so helpless. We in the West are their only hope.”
Andrej Wischnewski (48) traveled all the way from Bremerhaven to sing for peace: “It was immediately clear to me that I had to come to the capital. I just couldn’t sit at home anymore while my father in Kiev has to hear the air raid alarm and is scared.”