Polish troops kill 7 in clash at mine

Press, 19 December 1981, Page 8

Polish troops kill 7 in clash at mine

NZPA-Reuter Vienna Poland has officially confirmed that seven people died and hundreds were injured as troops moved to stamp out worker resistance to the new military authorities.

Seven workers were killed when security forces opened fire on strikers who attacked them at a mine in Katowice, while more than 300 civilians and members of the security forces were injured in violence in the Baltic port of Gdansk, Warsaw radio said. The clashes occurred on Thursday.

State television said a demonstration by a group of young people was broken up in Warsaw on Thursday, the eleventh anniversary of riots in Gdansk over food prices that toppled Wladyslaw Gomulka’s Government. Travellers on the first flights out of Warsaw said the Solidarity trade union

movement had called on Poles to stage a silent protest against martial law yesterday by switching off their home lights for one hour. With communications still cut, there was no way of knowing whether the protest call was heeded. Travellers said the switchoff call was made on widely distributed Solidarity posters which also asserted that 46,000 people had been arrested since the military clamp-down last week-end. Western diplomatic sources put the number of detainees between 15,000 to 75,000.

Poland's Ambassador to Sweden confirmed yesterday that Solidarity’s leader, Lech Walesa, was under house arrest. Earlier reports suggested that he had psychologically cracked under the strain of the crisis.

Passengers flying out to the West yesterday painted a sombre picture of the mood in the Polish capital. “People

are very sad and very down,” said one woman arriving in Rome. A Detroit purchasing agent, flying in to New York from Warsaw, said: “The Army is in control of everything. There are troops and tanks everywhere. The people are very frightened.” The same type of report emanated from Bonn, travellers reporting that the military authorities were using massive force to establish complete physical and psychological control of the country. French officials . said Poland's Catholic bishops had accused the new Government of using military force to terrorise the population. The message from the Polish Council of Bishops spoke of massive internments in deplorable conditions and said the week-end military take-over struck a blow to hopes of national reconciliation in Poland.

Broadcasts from Warsaw yesterday said that martial law would mean faster trials and stiffer penalties in Polish courts. Those convicted would have no right to appeal and the death sentence might be used for crimes that did not carry it before.

Warsaw radio said in its latest resume of the situation that “in the overwhelming majority of work places, work is proceeding undisturbed."

The British Broadcasting Corporation reported that the Polish authorities imposed martial law after an ultimatum from the Soviet Commander-in-Chief of the Warsaw Pact forces.

The 8.8. C., citing semiofficial contacts, said Marshal Viktor Kulikov issued the ultimatum last week to the Polish leader, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, telling him: “If you don’t do it. we will."