'A giant' of post-war history

European leaders joined with former US president Bill Clinton at an emotional tribute in Strasbourg yesterday for former German chancellor Helmut Kohl, the father of German reunification and a founder of modern-day Europe.

"A giant of the post-war period has left us," European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker said in an oration in French and German.

"Helmut Kohl was a German patriot, but he was also a European patriot," said Juncker, the only current leader in Europe to have worked alongside the iconic figure.

"Helmut Kohl was not just the architect of Germany unity. He contributed substantially, more than others, to the reconciliation between European history and European geography."

Kohl, who served as chancellor from 1982 to 1998, died on June 16 at age 87.

On his watch, the pro-Western and pro-Soviet states of West and East Germany reunified after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, becoming one of the stablest and most prosperous democracies in the world.

With former French president Francois Mitterrand, Kohl also drove the expansion and integration of the EU.

Together, they helped to open up its membership to fledgling democracies of the former Soviet bloc, create the euro single currency and ripped away internal border controls.

"Helmut Kohl was a privileged partner for France, an essential ally, but he was also more than that, he was a friend," French President Emmanuel Macron said.

"We are here to salute his mark in history."

Kohl's coffin was to be taken by helicopter to the German city of Ludwigshafen and then taken by boat down the Rhine to the southwest town of Speyer for his funeral service on Saturday.

Kohl's death on June 16 was followed on Friday by that of Simone Veil, another colossus of European history.

Veil, a Holocaust survivor and pioneer of women's rights in France, was the first president of the European Parliament.