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Vision for Europe Award Ceremony Speech by Jeffery Tesseler, Your Royal Highness, Madam Chancellor, Mister Prime Minister, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen, My
name is Jeff Tessler, I am the CEO of Clearstream International, Chairman of
the Edmond Israel Foundation. It is
a pleasure and an honour for me to welcome you to the Vision for Europe Award
2006. This
is the 9th time that the Edmond Israel Foundation is giving this award in
recognition of outstanding achievements in taking Europe into the future. The
previous laureate, in 2003, was His Excellency Dr Javier Solana and two
other previous laureates, their excellencies Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker and Prime Minister Jacques Santer are present with
us here tonight. It is
also the second time the award goes to a German Chancellor after Helmut Kohl,
in 1997. But this is the first time , the Foundation has elected a woman, the first
woman to become Chancellor of Germany. We are particularly honoured, Madam
Chancellor, that you have accepted this year’s Vision for Europe Award. The Foundation was created in 1990 in honour of the first chairman of Clearstream, Edmond Israel. I extend a warm welcome to Edmond, who is here with us tonight and who will conclude the programme after Chancellor Merkel’s acceptance speech. The Foundation is a non-profit organisation whose goals are the support
and promotion of cultural, scientific, political and economic activities on a
European and world-wide scale. The Vision for Europe award is a cornerstone
in this endeavour. I
hope that you will all enjoy this evening and after the programme ends, at
about 6 o’clock, we will be pleased to invite you to a reception. I would
also like to sincerely thank DEXIA BIL for their generosity in co-sponsoring
our ceremony this evening. Let me now welcome the 1998 recipient of the Vision for Europe Award: His
excellency Jean-Claude Juncker, Prime Minister of the Grand Duchy of
Luxembourg who will give the laudatio for this year’s recipient. His speech
will be followed by the Presentation of the award and Chancellor Merkel’s
acceptance speech> Your
Royal Highness, Madam Chancellor, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
Thank you very much for your attention. Mr
Prime Minister, the floor is yours.
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