East German P.M. Names Cabinet Of 18 Members

Northern Advocate, 13 October 1949, Page 5

East German P.M. Names Cabinet Of 18 Members

BERLIN, Wed. (11 a.m.).—The 330 members of the Lower House of the new East German Republic assembled today in Goering’s former Air Ministry to hear the first Prime Minister (Otto Grotewohl, the Communist leader) announce the Cabinet Ministers he had appointed. The Prime Minister said Cabinet would consist of himself, three deputy Premiers and 14 Ministers. Six portfolios had been allotted to Communists —Planning, Industry, Education, Justice, Interior and Supply, and Foreign Trade.

The deputy Premiers are Walter Ulbricht (Socialist Unity Party), Otto Nuschke (Christian Democratic Union!, and Herman Kasfner (Liberal Democratic Party).

cd on the three Allied commanders today and demanded that West Berlin be named the twelfth state in the Bonn Republic. The spokesman said they wanted Western Berlin completely clear from the Grotewohl Government's influence. Parliament formally confirmed Otto Grotewohl as Prime Minister, accepted his Cabinet and approved a programme of Communist ideals. Delegates sat through a full day’s speeches to reach their one moment of action. When it came they voted for the regime by jumping to attention. Grotewohl and a score of other speakers during the day thanked the Russians for giving their blessing to the East German Government, and attacked the Western powers in terms of “imperialistic capitalistic warmongers.” Parliament's action was similar to the system used by the Russians. Speakers from each part-. Communist trade unions, Communist youth organisations and the womens league, extolled Grotewohl and his Cabinet before members rose as a man to give their legal sanction. Grotewohl, in his speech to the Assembly. sounded the same theme as at last night's mammoth torchlight parade ‘’peace, and unification of Germany.” “We know that in our fight for unity which is simultaneously a fight for peace—we are not alone." shouted Grotewohl. "We know that the Soviet Union stands at our side.”

The Foreign Affairs Minister is Georg Detinger (Christian Democratic Union), the Minister of Finance, Hans Loch (Liberal Democratic Party), and the Minister of Supply and Foreign Trade, Georg Handke (Socialist Unity Party). In his induction speech, Prime Minister Grotewohl laid down a sixpoint programme: (1) Pledging Eastern Germany’s “foreign policy” to that adopted by the Soviet satellite Foreign _ Ministers at the Warsaw conference in 1948. (2) Accepting the Oder-Neisse frontier, which ceded former German territory to Poland and Russia, as the final “peace border.” (3) Developing trade with Communist China, (4) A new economic plan, even more intensive than the current two-year plan, to get under way in 1950. (5> Abolition of food rationing next year, except for meat and sugar. (6) Equal rights for former Nazis who were not convicted of direct crimes, and a “fight with the sharpest forces of law against any revival of Nazism, militarism, or Fascism." Meanwhile, West Berlin city officials have started a new drive for Western Berlin to be included in the West German Government at Bonn. A delegation headed by tiie* chairman of .the assembly (Otto Suhr), call-