[1] Both nations are members of the Council of Europe, European Union, NATO and the Eurozone.

Some German cities (like Hanau and Cologne) are or were traditional centres of Belgian Protestant Diaspora.

[citation needed] German is besides Dutch and French also the third official language in Belgium.

The territory currently comprising the German-speaking community in Belgium was taken from Germany following World War I, as stipulated the Treaty of Versailles as compensation for the Allied countries.

In 1914, German Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg formed a plan to establish a Central European Economic Union, comprising a number of European countries, including Germany and Belgium, in which, as he secretly stressed, there was to be a semblance of equality among the member states, but in fact it was to be under German leadership to cement Germany's economic hegemony over Central Europe (see also: Mitteleuropa).