A year ago, preparations began at the Willy Brandt Kreis to hold a commemorative event to mark the 100th anniversary of Egon Bahr's birth. "Today, we find ourselves in a completely new situation in terms of world politics," says Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, calling the all-out attack on Ukraine a watershed. "Such an epochal break is a brutal violation of all the agreements that bind us," she says, listing the Charter of Paris, the Budapest Memorandum and the UN Charter. Furthermore, says Wieczorek-Zeul, a former development minister, says there are broader problems, too. "This epochal break will increase hunger and poverty to extreme levels among those who are poorest in the Global South.” Are we in the prosperous West aware of this danger yet? -mb

Katrin Rulle