Army to keep clamps on

Press, 4 March 1982, Page 9

Army to keep clamps on

NZPA-Reuter Moscow The Polish military leader. General Wojciech Jaruzelski, pledged yesterday to crack down on any future threat to Communist Party supremacy in Poland as he ended a visit to Moscow which gained firm Soviet endorsement of his rule. In a joint communique issued after two days of talks in the Kremlin: he made it clear that Warsaw had no intention of relaxing the tough measures introduced with the" declaration of martial law on December 13. He was said to have pledged to the Kremlin chiefs that any attempts to “resume actions aimed at causing ? economic disarray ... or at changing the social and political system will be cut short most resolutely in the future too.” In return, General Jaruzelski gained an outright vote of confidence from President Leonid Brezhnev and the other senior members of the Soviet hierarchy involved in the talks. The communique said the measures taken by the Warsaw military leadership since the clamp-down had been “received with full understanding” in Moscow. Soviet leaders had also pledged to give more aid to Poland and to help revive its industries if the situation in the country remained stable. Diplomats said the warm welcome given to General Jaruzelski, and the tone of the communique indicated that the Kremlin viewed martial law as the best way of governing Poland in the immediate future. The composition of General Jaruzelski’s delegation also suggested that there

were no plans for a return to civilian rule in Warsaw for some time, they said. The Polish leader took only second-ranking members of the Communist leadership with him to Moscow and was accompanied by the Deputy Defence Minister (Florian Siwicki) believed to be in charge of the day-to-day running of military Government. If a return to Communist Party , rule had been considered in the near future, senior party men such as Politburo members would have been included on the trip, the diplomats said. Moscow radio said that Mr Brezhnev had accepted an invitation to visit Poland. The report did not.mention a date for the visit. An eightmember delegation from the United States Congress is due in Poland today for a visit which will concentrate on economic matters and a review of humanitarian aid to the country. In West Germany a Polish violinist, Wanda ’ Wilkomirska, the divorced wife of a Deputy Prime Minister, Mieczyslaw Rakowski, ‘ said yesterday that she would not return to Poland after her concert tour in the West. In Poland she had always been vociferous in protesting against restrictions on personal freedom and human rights, but she would keep silent in the West, she said. She separated from Mr Rakowski six years ago and they were divorced last year. In Rome the head of the Franciscan Order says that Maximilian Kolbe, a Polish Franciscan friar executed in a German concentration camp, will be proclaimed a saint by Pope John Paul on October 10.