Grandson of the former East German leader reveals: Honecker's urn is at "good friend"

It is a surprising news: The urns of Erich and Margot Honecker have not yet been buried. This was revealed by her grandson Roberto Yañez Betancourt. He wishes that the urns in Berlin will be buried in the cemetery of the Socialists.

The info comes from the book "I was the last citizen of the GDR". In it, the 44-year-old grandson revealed the family secret, as reported by the "Berliner Zeitung", the "Berliner Kurier", the "Bild" newspaper and the "BZ" on Saturday.

But why have not the urns been buried? The reason Yánez 'co-author Thomas Grimm calls in the book, which appears on Monday (September 10): It was always the desire of the last GDR state and SED party leader, "to find his last resting place in Germany - preferably in his Saarland birthplace in Neukirchen, "he told the" Berliner Zeitung ".

Margot Honecker lived since the early nineties in Santiago de Chile with her daughter Sonja, who was married to a Chilean. Her husband Erich Honecker also left for Chile at the beginning of 1993, after the lawsuit against him for manslaughter of GDR refugees due to his cancer had been stopped in Germany. Her 15-year-old husband briefly lived with Margot Honecker before he died on May 29, 1994, at the age of 81.

Wish to be buried in Germany

The erstwhile First Lady of the GDR left the urn of her husband until her own death in 2016 with a good friend. This now also preserve the ashes of the once mighty East German education minister, it was said. The family still hopes for an opportunity to settle the two together in Germany.

However, Honecker's daughter Sonja opposed it. She wanted to hand over the ashes of her parents to the Pacific. Grandson Roberto, on the other hand, regards his grandparents as persons of German contemporary history and therefore considers it right to bury them in Germany. "Best in the cemetery of the Socialists in Friedrichsfelde at the side of their former comrades," described Grimm the desire Robertos.

Roberto Yañez is a painter, poet and musician living in Chile. He had left his hometown Berlin with his family after the fall of the Wall. He is the son of Honecker's daughter Sonja. In the book, he also describes his heavy drug and alcohol dependence, so the "BZ". His grandmother had sent him to Cuba for withdrawal and therapy.