<P> On 28 November 1989--two weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall--West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl announced a 10 - point program calling for the two Germanys to expand their cooperation with a view toward eventual reunification . </P> <P> Initially, no timetable was proposed . However, events rapidly came to a head in early 1990 . First, in March, the Party of Democratic Socialism--the former Socialist Unity Party of Germany--was heavily defeated in East Germany's first free elections . A grand coalition was formed under Lothar de Maizière, leader of the East German wing of Kohl's Christian Democratic Union, on a platform of speedy reunification . Second, East Germany's economy and infrastructure underwent a swift and near - total collapse . While East Germany was long reckoned as having the most robust economy in the Soviet bloc, the removal of Communist hegemony revealed the ramshackle foundations of that system . The East German mark had been almost worthless outside East Germany for some time before the events of 1989--90, and the collapse of the East German economy further magnified the problem . </P> <P> Discussions immediately began on an emergency merger of the German economies . On 18 May 1990, the two German states signed a treaty agreeing on monetary, economic and social union . This treaty is called Vertrag über die Schaffung einer Währungs -, Wirtschafts - und Sozialunion zwischen der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik und der Bundesrepublik Deutschland ("Treaty Establishing a Monetary, Economic and Social Union between the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany"); it came into force on 1 July 1990, with the West German Deutsche Mark replacing the East German mark as the official currency of East Germany . The Deutsche Mark had a very high reputation among the East Germans and was considered stable . While the GDR transferred its financial policy sovereignty to West Germany, the West started granting subsidies for the GDR budget and social security system . At the same time many West German laws came into force in the GDR . This created a suitable framework for a political union by diminishing the huge gap between the two existing political, social, and economic systems . </P> <P> The Volkskammer, the Parliament of East Germany, passed a resolution on 23 August 1990 declaring the accession (Beitritt) of the German Democratic Republic to the Federal Republic of Germany, and the extension of the field of application of the Federal Republic's Basic Law to the territory of East Germany as allowed by article 23 of the West German Basic Law, effective 3 October 1990 . The East German Declaration of Accession (Beitrittserklärung) to the Federal Republic, as provided by article 23 of the West German Basic Law, was approved by the Volkskammer on 23 August, and formally presented by its President to the President of the West German Bundestag by means of a letter dated 25 August 1990 . Thus, formally, the procedure of reunification by means of the accession of East Germany to West Germany, and of East Germany's acceptance of the Basic Law already in force in West Germany, was initiated as the unilateral, sovereign decision of East Germany, as allowed by the then existing provision of article 23 of the West German Basic Law . </P>

The first step in the reunification of east and west germany was uniting their