Berlin 17 Jun (ANA) - Helmut Kohl, described as the father of German reunification and an architect of European integration, has died in his house in Ludwigshafen. Germany's longest serving post-war chancellor from 1982 to 1998, he left active politics in 2002. He served longer than Konrad Adenauer, West Germany's first post-World War II chancellor and his political idol. Only Otto von Bismarck, who first unified Germany in the 1870s, was chancellor longer, for 19 years. He was a driving force behind the introduction of the European single currency, convincing sceptical Germans to give up the Deutsche Mark. In the UK, he is remembered for his differences over the EU with the late UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Kohl had been frail and wheelchair-bound since suffering a bad fall in 2008. The end of his career was blighted by economic problems in the old East Germany and a financial scandal within his own Christian Democratic Union party.(ANA)

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