3 Solidarity Leaders Givn Prison Terms

GDANSK, Poland — Three Solidarity leaders were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 years by a Polish court Friday after they were convicted of inciting civil unrest by calling a 15-minute strike that never took place.

Lech Walesa, leader of the now-outlawed Solidarity trade union movement, denounced the verdicts as “the stupidest move the government could make.” He called on Poles to “protest against attempts to create anarchy and a climate of hatred.”

The Gdansk provincial court convicted Adam Michnik, 38, Bogdan Lis, 32, and Wladyslaw Frasyniuk, 30, of two counts of inciting public unrest by calling for a 15-minute strike in February and engaging in illegal union activities.

The court sentenced Frasyniuk to 3 1/2 years in prison, Michnik to 3 years and Lis to 2 1/2 years. They had faced maximum prison terms of 7 1/2 years.

Appeals Planned

Defense counsel said they would appeal the sentences to the Polish Supreme Court.

The trial was viewed as the most significant action by Poland’s Communist authorities against political opponents since an amnesty last July freed the three defendants and more than 600 other political prisoners from prison.

Krystyna Frasyniuk, wife of Wladyslaw Frasyniuk, emerged weeping from the courtroom and told Western reporters--who were not allowed to cover the proceedings--that the three men received the verdict “with calm and dignity.”

Other relatives said the men accepted the verdict with smiles and showed good spirits.

Victory Signs

“When the verdict was being passed, all of them smiled and later they shook hands one with each other,” said Lis’ mother, Wladyslawa. “I flashed a V-sign to my son and he responded in the same way.”

Frasyniuk’s wife said her husband told her he would serve his sentence in Barczewo in northeastern Poland, where many political prisoners have been jailed.

The defendants were arrested in a police raid on a Feb. 13 meeting in Gdansk presided over by Walesa at which the prosecution said they were making plans for the strike, scheduled for Feb. 28.

The strike was called to protest government plans to raise food prices but was canceled when the government agreed to more gradual price increases.

Order Disturbed

Chief Judge Krzysztof Zieniuk said it did not matter that the strike did not occur. He said the three disturbed public order by merely calling for a strike, according to observers in the courtroom.

“This trial is not a political trial,” observers quoted Zieniuk as saying. “It is a normal trial.”

In Washington, the State Department said it is “deeply distressed” over the verdict in the case and said it is looking at possible actions to retaliate against the Polish government’s growing trend of oppression.

Walesa, winner of the 1983 Nobel Peace Prize, took the stand and assumed full responsibility for calling the meeting, but denied any criminal intent.

Walesa is under investigation and has been ordered not to leave Gdansk without informing police.

In a statement distributed to reporters after the sentences were announced, Walesa said the “verdict evoked deep concern” and reflected a “sickness” of the Polish authorities.

He said his three colleagues “are victims of the political deviation.”

The official Polish news agency PAP, meanwhile, said a court in the southeastern city of Rzeszow had sentenced three Solidarity supporters, Andrzej Filipczyk, Jerzy Kajak and Roman Broka, to prison terms of 1 to 1 1/2 years for distributing underground literature calling for the February strike.