LIVE STREAM: Berlin celebrates 25th anniversary of fall of the Wall

BERLIN – As Germany celebrated the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on Sunday, Elke Rosin recalled how lucky her family had been.

Her pet parakeet and a few personal belongings were all that Rosin managed to grab before her family fled from East to West Berlin 53 years ago. Hours after their frantic escape, the communist authorities in East Germany sealed off the border and began building the Wall.

“We all got away and nobody died,” said Rosin, who is now 70.

Others weren’t so fortunate. During its 28-year existence, at least 138 people died at the Wall, and hundreds more were jailed for trying to escape.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel honoured their memory and paid tribute to those who helped bring down the Wall, calling its collapse an example of the human yearning for freedom.

On the night of Nov. 9, 1989, thousands of East Berliners streamed through the once-closed border crossings after communist authorities caved in to mounting pressure and relaxed travel restrictions that had prevented their citizens from going to the west for decades.

“It was about reclaiming freedom, about being citizens, not subjects,” Merkel said at the main memorial site for the Wall on Bernauer Strasse.

— With files from The Associated Press