E. Germans to be allowed to travel freely

Press, 26 October 1989, Page 8

E. Germans to be allowed to travel freely

NZPA-Reuter East Berlin East Germany’s leaders have promised to let their citizens travel abroad, 28 years after building the Berlin Wall to stop them doing so.

Bowing to increasing pressure, the Communist Party Politburo said yesterday that it would draft a law this year allowing all citizens a passport and the right to travel.

“It is planned that every citizen will have the right to a passport and to travel with a visa to all countries and West Berlin — without needing to have family ties and other previously demanded grounds for travel,” the Politburo said.

If the promise is fulfilled and East Germans are allowed to visit the West freely, it would be an unprecedented about-turn by one of the most hardline Governments in eastern Europe.

East Germany built the Berlin Wall in 1961 to stop a haemorrhage of its people to the West. Since then, it has shot, imprisoned or branded as traitors those who tried to breach the fortifications.

More than 120,000 East Germans have fled to the West this year, both legally and illegally, the largest exodus since the wall was built.

Thousands of people again underlined their dissatisfaction with the lack of reform by taking to the streets of East Berlin yesterday just hours after the new party leader, Egon Krenz, was appointed head of State.

“The people didn’t elect you, Mr Krenz” was one of the chants as the crowd snaked through the

centre of the divided city, whistling and cat-calling outside the Communist Party headquarters and the Parliament.

Western journalists estimated their number at up to 10,000 while the official news agency, A.D.N., unusually, gave a higher figure of about 12,000. The police guarded public buildings but did not intervene. Mr Krenz, who replaced a hardliner, Erich Honecker, as party leader on October 18, appealed to East Germans not to desert the country. “Our homeland, your friends, your colleagues, we all need you. Everyone who leaves is one too many,” he said. Mr Krenz’s election inspired not only street protests but an unprecedented revolt in the legislature. Fifty-two deputies refused to support his candidacy, a sign of the enormous pressure which this month’s unrest has exerted on East Germany’s political establishment. There was further evidence on the streets. East Berlin party officials and trade union activists argued with demonstrators and bystanders, trying to persuade them that the winds of change were blowing through the party. “I agree with much of what you say about our problems,” said one woman activist, a party official in an East Berlin factory. “But we must work constructively to resolve them. These

demonstrations could lead to chaos.” This echoed the words of the new leader, who told Parliament: “The demonstrations, even if they are well-intentioned, always carry in this complicated time the danger that they might not end so peacefully as they began.” One young demonstrator complained heatedly that her career as a nurse had been hampered because she had expressed critical views openly at party meetings. “The meetings always dealt with abstract, theoretical rubbish, not with real problems. There is no real democracy here,” she said.

A party official said he sympathised. “But all that will change. There will be a lot of new faces under comrade Krenz.” The Politburo also said the party’s policy-making Central Committee would meet from November 8 to 10, one month earlier than planned. The committee has the power to make changes in the 18-member Politburo, the country’s highest political body.

Diplomats said Mr Krenz, aged 52, would probably seek to oust more ageing, conservative leaders from the Politburo after securing the removal last week of Mr Honecker and the party secretaries for the economy and propaganda.