Thirty years on from the fall of the Berlin Wall, a tale of two cities tells why Germany remains divided

The old Trabant factory lies abandoned on a hill overlooking the east German city of Zwickau, plaster crumbling from its brickwork, and gaping holes in the windows where the glass is gone. It is a potent image: the factory where they built the car that became a symbol of communist East Germany, left to fall slowly into ruin.

But the factory tells a more complicated story. Thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Germany is still profoundly divided. The former communist East still lags behind economically, and its cities are emptying as young people head west in search of work. More than half of people in the East say they feel like second-class citizens in their own country.

It is fertile…

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