E. Berlin Shots Halt Man Trying to Leap to Freedom

East German border guards, firing between 30 and 50 rounds, riddled a young man with submachine-gun fire, apparently killing him as he was about to jump from the Berlin Wall to freedom Monday, police said.

“I got you, you pig,” a guard said as he looked at the victim after he fell back into East Berlin territory, according to witnesses and a police spokesman.

A second guard, apparently disgusted at the sight of the victim--whose white shirt was soaked with blood--threw his cap down in disgust and shouted an expletive, witnesses said. The guard was apparently taken into custody and led away, they said.

The victim had just climbed a ladder to the top of the 10-foot wall when guards opened fire. “He showed no sign of life,” the police spokesman said. “His body was covered with canvas and carried away.”

The shooting occurred at 1:30 a.m. on the border between East Germany and the French sector’s suburban Fronhau district of West Berlin.

Ottfried Hennig, a minister in Bonn’s Inner-German Affairs Ministry, said that “Wild West-style shooting” at the wall is unacceptable in relations between Bonn and East Germany.

West German government spokesman Friedhelm Ost said, “As long as people who want nothing more than to live in freedom face the danger of dying in a hail of bullets, the politicians of the GDR (East Germany) contradict their own words about human rights and peace.”

The Western allies responsible for security in West Berlin--the United States, Britain and France--also condemned the shooting, saying it showed contempt for human life.

“Opening fire on defenseless people can only inspire deepest indignation against those who carry out such practices,” a statement issued by the three nations said.

West Berlin Mayor Eberhard Diepgen said the shooting “marks a new, tragic phase in the use of weapons at the wall.”

He said guards had fired on eight people along the 103-mile wall around West Berlin since June.

Hennig said last week that “more than 100 people have paid with their lives for their attempt to escape from socialism to freedom” since construction of the Berlin Wall was started in August, 1961.

Police said 26 other refugees--two East Germans, 17 Poles and seven Czechs--fled safely to the West in separate weekend escapes.