Berlin gears up for EU birthday party

Germans pride themselves on putting on a good party - take the Munich beer festival or last year's soccer World Cup - and Berlin is preparing for another big celebration next week.

This time the European Union is the excuse. As EU president, Germany is pulling out the stops for festivities on March 24-25 to mark the 50th anniversary of the founding Treaty of Rome.

Chancellor Angela Merkel hopes the revelries will reawaken enthusiasm, especially among young Germans, for Europe as opinion polls show support is waning.

"We want to create a party atmosphere and awaken curiosity in Europe," said a government official. "It's a public celebration and we want to remind people of the big idea."

Festivities have already begun across Europe. In Britain, Manchester United played an exhibition soccer match against a European XI to a sell-out crowd at its Old Trafford ground on Tuesday.

But Berlin, half of which was under Soviet occupation 50 years ago, has its own plans.

While leaders of the 27 nations listen to Beethoven at the Berlin Philharmonic before signing a declaration on European values, free beer and sausages are expected to lure hundreds of thousands of Germans onto the streets.

Stands displaying the culinary highlights of each member state will surround the Brandenburg Gate - the city's central symbol - where bands will perform on an open air stage.

The eclectic line-up includes Outlandish, a Muslim-Catholic hip-hop group from Denmark, Romania's Mahal Rai Banda which plays Balkan Gypsy music, and ageing British rocker Joe Cocker.

Clubbers can jive, rave or rock to Slovenian, Cypriot or Estonian rhythms at 35 of Berlin's fabled nightclubs, and museums will stay open all night.

Berlin, a reunited city once divided by the legacy of war, seems an appropriate venue for the celebrations, say diplomats, who note the European project's founders were driven by a will to avoid the devastation of another war after 1945.

"We want to celebrate 50 years of European integration and also the end of the division of the continent. Berlin has a major symbolic significance in this regard," government spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm told reporters.

The festivities will take place in the historical centre of the city, near the site of the Berlin Wall which fell in 1989. But if Merkel hopes the €1.7 million party will boost support for the EU, she may be mistaken.

Rifts between members are evident even over the wording of a couple of pages of non-binding text, the Berlin Declaration, which the leaders are due to sign. It will cover the EU's achievements, values and future challenges.

Some diplomats are privately dreading the occasion. "The intention is good but the idea that the leaders will have to wander around each others' stands to show we are a big happy family risks looking a bit forced," said one EU diplomat.

"I think some leaders will be trying to avoid each other." Other nations are marking the anniversary in their own way. Estonians will plant thousands of trees and Danes will get chocolate delicacies known as "romkluger", or Rome pastries.

In Madrid, students from international schools will give a concert and a giant European puzzle will be constructed while the preamble of the Treaty of Rome is read out to the crowd.

Italy will show 27 works of art, Polish students will pen their own Berlin Declaration and in Roman Catholic Ireland, a prayer will be said in every church to mark the occasion.