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Official wants Stones to rock Stasi archive

Roland Jahn, the head of an archive of East German secret police files, wants the Rolling Stones to rock the roof of the Stasi authority.

Official wants Stones to rock Stasi archive
Photo: DPA

In an interview with the regional daily Rheinische Post on Thursday, Jahn said it was his personal dream to have the ageing English rockers play atop the archive building in eastern Berlin.

“The Stones had special meaning for East German youth,” Jahn told the paper. “Their songs symbolized freedom and self-determination.”

More than two decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Jahn is hoping to turn the archive housing the Stasi documents into a “Campus of Democracy” to teach younger Germans about more than just communist East Germany’s notorious secret police.

Jahn said he thought up the idea of the Rolling Stones concert after stumbling across files about a rumoured appearance by the band in 1969 in West Berlin right next to the Wall. Several East Germans hoping to glimpse Mick Jagger and his cohorts were rounded up and thrown in jail at the time.

“A concert on the rooftop of the former Stasi headquarters would symbolize liberation: This is where the people stormed the building and secured the files,” he said.

The Local/mry

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