PRESIDENT MARY McAleese has said that EU members must set the "highest standards" on the financial affairs of public figures following German revelations of a Europe-wide tax-evasion network.
Mrs McAleese was speaking yesterday on the first full day of her state visit to Germany, ahead of a meeting today with the chancellor, Dr Angela Merkel.
Dr Merkel has demanded that public figures lead by example on their financial affairs, as details of a multibillion-euro tax evasion scam involving 1,400 clients of a Liechtenstein bank spreads from Germany to Britain and France.
"I think it is an issue that affects us all," said Mrs McAleese, responding to a question on the matter. "I think that it is why in every parliament within the EU and within every jurisdiction within the EU we set the highest standards and the highest levels of accountability."
The President, accompanied by Dr Martin McAleese, began her German visit yesterday with a call on the federal president, Horst Köhler, a close adviser to former chancellor Helmut Kohl and former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
President Köhler praised Ireland's economic transformation as testimony to "Irish readiness to tap their own potential and their openness for reform".
In return, President McAleese underlined the "considerable impact for good" of EU membership. "Germany has always been a champion of smaller EU countries," she said. "We are grateful to have such a good friend in Germany."
After discussing integration issues, Mr Köhler said that four decades after migrant workers began arriving in Germany, he believed the issue of mutual respect was key to successful co-existence.
"One has to be very attentive to look at the cultural roots of others and see to it that a person integrates into everyday life," he said.
Mrs McAleese visited Berlin's Neue Wache, the central memorial for victims of war and tyranny. To the melody of The Good Comrade, she laid a wreath at the powerful Grieving Mother statue by German artist Käthe Kollwitz.
"People of my generation feel very close to this city, it broke our hearts in its brokenness and it raises our hearts in its completeness," said President McAleese after a stroll through the Brandenburg Gate with Berlin mayor Klaus Wowereit.
