World leaders descend on Berlin 20 years after infamous Wall's fall

Twenty years after the Berlin Wall tumbled in a peaceful revolution, world leaders will meet today in a transformed Germany to fete its shining moment in history and huddle over daunting problems ahead. The celebrations will culminate in a gathering of luminaries past and present with an estimated 100,000 revellers at the Brandenburg Gate, a potent symbol of unity that was long on the fault line between East and West.

United Germany is basking in the global spotlight on this 20th anniversary, with events, large and small, recalling the heady night when East Germany's communist authorities stunned the world by suddenly opening the border.

After 28 years as prisoners of their own country, euphoric East Germans streamed to checkpoints and rushed past bewildered border guards, many falling tearfully into the arms of West Germans welcoming them on the other side.

The fall of the Wall sent shockwaves around the world that night, abruptly ending the Cold War and paving the way for the unification of Germany, which had been divided since the end of World War II.

"The destruction of the Iron Curtain on November 9, 1989 is still the most remarkable political event of most people's lifetimes: It set free millions of individuals and it brought to an end a global conflict that threatened nuclear annihilation," British weekly The Economist said last week.

In the run-up to the festivities, Angela Merkel last Tuesday became the first German Chancellor to address a joint session of the US Congress.

With a speech steeped in Wall imagery, she thanked Washington for its firm support of German unification and called for bolstered transatlantic cooperation on crucial issues such as climate change.

"I'm convinced, just as we found the strength in the 20th century to bring about the fall of a wall made of concrete and barbed wire, we shall now show that necessary strength to overcome the walls of the 21st century," said Mrs Merkel, who grew up in communist East Germany.

The leaders of Britain, France, Russia are due in Berlin, as well as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who will represent the United States while President Barack Obama tours Asia.

They will be joined by former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, ex-Polish president Lech Walesa and German civil rights activists who will meet at Bornholmer Strasse, one of the places where the Wall was first breached. Israeli-Argentinian conductor Daniel Barenboim will then lead the State Opera orchestra and choir in a concert at the Gate before Mr Gorbachev topples the first of thousands of giant styrofoam dominos along two kilometres of the Wall's former course.

US rockers Bon Jovi and German DJ Paul van Dyk will entertain the crowd into the night. Bilateral meetings are planned on the sidelines of the ceremonies on urgent issues including Iran's nuclear ambitions, Afghanistan and the choice of the first permanent European Union president.