Kristy Ram­nar­ine

Kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

Peace and rec­on­cil­i­a­tion.

Two words aimed at one pur­pose.

An im­por­tant fo­cus for the French and Ger­man Em­bassies as they once again host a clas­si­cal mu­si­cal con­cert which is sched­uled to take place at the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (NA­PA) on Jan­u­ary 22 at 6.30 p.m.

The event is in cel­e­bra­tion of the Fran­co-Ger­man Day – a cel­e­bra­tion of the his­toric Treaty of Elysée, signed on Jan­u­ary 22, 1963, by France and Ger­many to strength­en their friend­ship and co­op­er­a­tion.

“The aim of the event is to bring to­geth­er two coun­tries which time has brought clos­er, but has had some op­po­si­tion through­out his­to­ry,” said French Am­bas­sador Di­di­er Chabert.

“The sign­ing of the Elysée treaty was a sig­nal of the rec­on­cil­i­a­tion of not on­ly the Gov­ern­ment but al­so of the peo­ple of both coun­tries.”

Am­bas­sador Chabert said the aim of the event was two-fold.

“You know Gov­ern­ment could cre­ate cri­sis but the peo­ple al­ways want peace, friend­ship, rec­on­cil­i­a­tion, and it is pos­si­ble. The ex­am­ple giv­en by France and Ger­many shows that it is al­ways pos­si­ble.

“It’s not on­ly to have a French Ger­man com­mon joint event, which is im­por­tant to mark the strong re­la­tion­ships be­tween our coun­tries, but al­so to give and ex­am­ple that cri­sis has to be over­come.”

Ger­man Am­bas­sador Christo­pher Eick em­pha­sised the sen­ti­ments ex­pressed by his diplo­mat­ic col­league.

“We hope it’s an ex­am­ple for oth­er sit­u­a­tions in oth­er coun­tries,” he said.

“You may think it’s a small thing but I think it is im­por­tant in a coun­try like Trinidad and To­ba­go which has been a pro­mot­er of peace in the re­gion to re­in­force the sen­ti­ment that peo­ple and coun­tries can come to­geth­er.

“There is al­so a pre­ven­tive el­e­ment. We want to pre­vent things from hap­pen­ing and to bring peo­ple to­geth­er is a good thing.”

Am­bas­sador Di­di­er be­lieves it is high­ly im­por­tant to host the event at this time.

“We all know that Trinidad and To­ba­go is a key coun­try in­side CARI­COM, one of the founders of CARI­COM,” he said.

“CARI­COM has an im­por­tant role as the sta­bil­i­sa­tion or­gan­i­sa­tion of the re­gion in terms of re­gion­al in­te­gra­tion, re­gion­al pros­per­i­ty and to have this mes­sage here in Trinidad and To­ba­go which is prob­a­bly the most in­flu­en­tial coun­try in CARI­COM is im­por­tant .”

The clas­si­cal mu­sic con­cert will fea­ture sym­phon­ic mu­sic.

Di­rect­ed by Dr. Roger Hen­ry and fea­tur­ing vi­o­lin­ist, Si­mon Browne and So­pra­no, Na­talia Dop­well there will be mu­sic by Beethoven, Cheva­lier St George, De­bussy, Be­las­co and epic sym­phon­ic arrange­ments of Ca­lyp­so & So­ca.

The event is free and tick­ets can be ob­tained from the Box Of­fice at NA­PA.