The record
One of three slabs sent to eastern Poland by a German rural district in 2009, unveiled with Lech Wałęsa standing beside it a few kilometres from the Belarusian border.
Three wall monuments left Germany for the Polish county of Biała Podlaska at the end of March 2009, on the initiative of Karl-Heinz Schröter, the administrator of the German district of Oberhavel. Two went to the communes of Międzyrzec Podlaski and Kobylany. The third was unveiled here in Terespol in August 2009, in the presence of Schröter and of Lech Wałęsa.
The piece is not from the photographed inner-city Wall. It comes from the stretch that separated the Oberhavel municipality of Glienicke from the Berlin district of Reinickendorf — the outer ring around West Berlin, which ran through fields and gardens and which almost nobody photographed. A district gave away a piece of the border that had run along its own edge.
Terespol stands on the Bug facing Brest, at the crossing point of the road and rail route east. The frontier a few kilometres away is now the external border of the European Union, and the county administrator of Biała Podlaska, Tadeusz Łazowski, hoped openly that the monuments would draw visitors to a remote region. His stated wish for them was that they should carry the message of European unification eastward rather than the fact of division.
How did it get here?
A gift from the German district of Oberhavel, whose administrator Karl-Heinz Schröter arranged it; the elements come from the section of Wall between Glienicke in Oberhavel and Berlin-Reinickendorf. Oberhavel had already given monuments to two other partner districts, Tampere in Finland and Hudson County in the United States.
Sources & verification
Federal Foundation — Berlin Wall worldwide, site entry ↗
The three monuments sent to Powiat Bialski at the end of March 2009 by the Oberhavel district, the August 2009 Terespol unveiling with Lech Wałęsa and Karl-Heinz Schröter, the Glienicke–Reinickendorf origin of the concrete, the earlier gifts to Tampere and Hudson County, and Tadeusz Łazowski's hopes for the region.
Source accessed 2026-09-17
Federal Foundation — Berlin Wall worldwide ↗
The source lists this place as a Berlin Wall location. Coordinates, where supplied, are source-reported and may represent a general area. This is not independent verification of authenticity, current presence, or public access.
Source accessed 2026-09-17 · Source record 144
Last verified: Not yet verified
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