11/3/2009 11:47 AM
ET
(RTTNews) -
President Barack Obama met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the White House Tuesday morning, just a short while before she would become the first German chancellor in 50 years to address the U.S. Congress.
"I am thrilled to have Chancellor Merkel here today," Obama said. "I want to congratulate her again for her victory in her recent election, the formation of a government, and we are honored to have her visit the Oval Office."
Obama said that, by addressing the Congress, "a great honor" has been bestowed upon Merkel.
"It is, I think, a very appropriate honor that's been bestowed on Chancellor Merkel," Obama said. "Obviously the alliance between the United States and Germany has been an extraordinary pillar of the transatlantic relationship."
The president noted that Germany has been "an extraordinarily strong ally on a whole host of international issues," and that the U.S. appreciates "the sacrifices of German soldiers in Afghanistan, and our common work there to bring peace and stability to Afghanistan."
He added that, under Merkel, Germany has been an important ally on issues such as the global economy and climate change.
"I'm looking forward," Obama stated, "to many more years in which the American people and the German people are working together to expand the boundaries of freedom and to create prosperity for ordinary men and women on both sides of the Atlantic."
Meanwhile, Merkel said she was very much looking forward to "having an exchange of view with the president again."
"We have always had very intensive discussions and we're going to have those today again on issues that are of mutual interest to us and that we have been working on almost daily," she added.
Merkel said it "is obviously a very great honor for me to address today the joint session of Congress, both houses of Congress, as it were."
She added that she wanted to "use this opportunity today also to express our gratitude, my gratitude, to the American people for the support that the American people have given us throughout the process leading up to German reunification, and I think it something that I would like to later on say it very clearly also in my speech to both houses of Congress."
Merkel was first elected chancellor in 2005 and officially took office on November 22, 2005. She won re-election in the general vote in September 2009 and was formally re-elected by the German parliament's lower house in October.
by RTT Staff Writer
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