Only 20 days remain before Germany is reunited and restored to full sovereignty, 45 years after it was divided as the price of defeat.

But the new Germany emerging less than a year after peaceful revolution in the East has agreed to live within borders that reduce previous German territory, to renounce war except under strict conditions and, most critically, to hand over parts of its sovereignty at the very moment it comes into being.

The significance of yesterday’s signing ceremony in Moscow is the end of the post-war period. Germany has been recognised by the four wartime allies, including the two current superpowers, as the weightiest nation in Europe, occupying a pivotal role between East and West in the struggle to form a new order.

But as Hans-Dietrich Genscher, the federal Foreign Minister, put it, a united Germany would exercise its sovereignty in guaranteeing peace in Europe. Unity for the Germans meant greater responsibility, not striving for power, he said.

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He recalled ‘the infinite suffering’ of peoples, especially Jews, at the hands of the old, expansionist Germany.

The treaty signed yesterday sets severe and permanent restrictions on Germany’s room for manoeuvre. It defines the new nation as consisting of the German Democratic Republic, the Federal Republic of Germany and all Berlin, and commits it to renounce all other territorial claims.

The signing took place as a handful of Christian Democrat deputies, mainly exiles driven from former German territories, underlined continuing sensitivities by asking the constitutional court to veto the unification treaty on this issue.

Chancellor Helmut Kohl, jeered by such exiles for recognising after much wavering that Poland’s western borders are final, went out of his way yesterday to acknowledge Warsaw’s part in accepting German unification.

Article 2 of the settlement also declares unconditionally that any attempt to undermine peace, particularly preparing for an offensive war, is ‘unconstitutional and criminal.’

Germany can never again resort to arms except in conformity with its constitution and the UN Charter, which as the US has already discovered in the Gulf crisis, is severely limiting.

Germany’s formal renunciation of the production, possession and use of atomic, biological and chemical weapons is also enshrined within the treaty, along with the commitment to set a ceiling of 370,000 on its armed forces within 3 or 4 years. This is 120,000 less than the present strength of the Bundeswehr alone.

But the new diplomatic power of Germany was evident in the hectic last-minute negotiations before yesterday’s ceremony could take place. There had been four outstanding issues.

The West, with Bonn, had proposed suspending the four powers’ rights from October 3, the day of German unification. But Moscow insisted until the last minute that full sovereignty would only take effect after ratification of the settlement by all parties, including the Supreme Soviet.

In the end, partly due to mediation by Mr Genscher, Moscow dropped its demands and a separate declaration yesterday made plain that the four power rights would cease on the day of unification.

But Moscow managed, with the support of Bonn, to win acceptance of its refusal to allow Nato manoeuvres on what is now East German territory during the transitional period while Soviet troops are withdrawn. Nato troops will not be stationed in the East even though the united Germany will belong to the alliance.

The third outstanding issue concerned ‘dual-use’ equipment which the Russians wanted banned from East Germany. Article 5 of the treaty says that only German troops subject to Nato command can be stationed in the East after 1994, and without atomic weapons.

But Moscow has lifted its reserve over ‘dual-use’ weapons, which can now be stationed in East Germany after 1994 provided they are exclusively designed for conventional and not nuclear use.

The final issue was what Mr Genscher called ‘the price of unity’. This was Moscow’s demand for hard cash for the stationing and withdrawal of its troops and for four separate Soviet-German treaties on new relations. Even with the agreement to pay the Soviet Union DM12 billion over four years, Bonn was unable to conclude final details of this last issue in separate negotiations held in Moscow yesterday.