Berlin honours legend Dietrich

Dietrich: Left Germany to become a US citizen

German screen legend Marlene Dietrich, who died in 1992, has been made an honorary citizen of Berlin - the home town with which she had a frosty relationship for much of her life.

Berlin's city authority said on Thursday it was honouring the actress as "an ambassador for a democratic, freedom-loving and humane Germany".

It added that its move "would symbolise the city of Berlin's reconciliation with her".

Dietrich - one of the biggest screen stars of the first half of the 20th Century - was born in Berlin in 1901.

She was admired for her air of mystery

She went to the US in 1930 and, following the rise to power of Adolf Hitler, turned her back on Germany and refused requests by the Nazis to return.

She became a US citizen in 1939, and sang for American troops as they fought her countrymen.

The honorary citizenship follows last year's public apology to the actress by Berlin's officials for the hostile treatment she received from the city as a result of her actions during the war.

'Traitor'

Dietrich died in Paris at the age of 90 but was buried, according to her wishes, in Berlin next to the grave of her mother, Josefine.

In 1960, Dietrich received an aggressive reception when she returned to her native town.

There were reports of bomb threats in protest at her visit.

Dietrich caused a sensation on The Blue Angel

Signs were put up on the streets reading "Marlene Go Home" and newspaper editorials called her "traitor".

As a result, Dietrich vowed she would never go back to Berlin.

The cool feelings remained mutual as Berlin's city authority only approved the naming of a square after her in 1997, after five years of debate.

But on 27 December 2000 - the day that would have been Dietrich's 100th birthday - city officials publicly asked forgiveness for the way she was received in 1960.

Wreaths were laid in a ceremony at Dietrich's grave at Freidenau cemetery in the German capital.

And Berlin mayor's chief of staff, Andre Schmitz, made a statement asking for forgiveness.

Medals

Dietrich found fame in 1929, in Germany's first talking film, Josef von Sternberg's Der Blaue Engel (The Blue Angel).

She played an unfaithful singer Lola Lola, exuding sexual decadence and personifying the ambiguities of the pre-Nazi, Weimar Germany.

On the day of The Blue Angel's première, she left Germany to seek her fortune in the US.

She became a worldwide star in the film Morocco, in which her character gave up everything to follow a foreign legionnaire played by Gary Cooper.

America, France and Israel later awarded her medals for her efforts during the war.

She made her last stage appearance in 1974, and her last film was 1979's Just a Gigolo.