Exodus of East Germans Swells : 16,000 More Pour Into Hungary; E. Berlin Decries Border Crossings

An estimated 16,000 East Germans arrived in Hungary from Czechoslovakia on Monday and headed straight for the Austro-Hungarian frontier and freedom in the West, Hungarian television reported from Budapest.

The broadcast said that additional thousands are expected to arrive in Hungary by way of Bulgaria and elsewhere in the East Bloc to join a vanguard of more than 6,000 of their compatriots who entered Austria bound for West Germany during the first 24 hours after Hungarian authorities opened the frontier to East Germans wishing to leave.

And many of the nearly 60,000 additional East German tourists already in Hungary when the barriers came down are expected to join the exodus, although many others do not intend to do so, Budapest Radio said.

26,000 Set Off for Home

“During the course of the day (Monday), about 26,000 East Germans set off back to their original homes (in East Germany),” the radio said.

The rising tide of westward-bound refugees, the largest such exodus since the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, provoked additional expressions of anger by East German leaders Monday. East Germany’s official news media accused Hungary of “organized smuggling of humans.”

East Germany’s anger caused a flurry of news reports that authorities in East Berlin would move to restrict its citizens’ travel to Hungary and elsewhere in the East Bloc, but the government denied the reports.

In a dispatch from Moscow, the official Soviet news agency Tass condemned Western media for what it called a “tendentious campaign” to spur illegal East German emigration. Tass accused West Germany’s embassies of illegally protecting East German refugees and supplying them with West German documents.

Several hundred East Germans, seeking safe passage to the West, are now holed up in West Germany’s embassy in Prague, Czechoslovakia.

Washington was enthusiastic about Hungary’s action--the first instance of an East Bloc nation openly defying one of its Warsaw Pact allies on the touchy issue of individuals seeking to settle in the West. White House Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater said, “We welcome the action by the Hungarian government to facilitate the emigration of East German citizens seeking refuge in the West.”

Fitzwater also commended Austria for assisting the refugees’ transit across its territory to reception centers that West German authorities have set up here in Passau and elsewhere in southeastern Bavaria.

Honecker Reported Slipping

West German news media reported Monday that the condition of East German leader Erich Honecker, who underwent gall bladder surgery last month, has deteriorated badly.

“According to information that allegedly comes from Communist Party officials, Honecker has no mental verve and no wish to get better,” the ZDF television network said.

Honecker, 77, has firmly resisted the kind of reforms that are sweeping much of the Eastern Bloc. Most of the fleeing East Germans cite dissatisfaction with the political and economic situation in their homeland as their reason for wanting to emigrate.

Refugees began crossing into West Germany from Austria less than five hours after Hungary opened its frontier and have been arriving at the rate of more than 200 an hour ever since.

Emotional scenes occurred frequently as the refugees reached Passau: Two leather-clad figures riding tandem gunned their 250cc motorcycle across the Austrian border and were greeted on the West German side by a good Samaritan who gave them each a fresh banana. The cyclists were a brother and sister, 20-year-old twins from Leipzig.

Spur of the Moment Decision

“We decided to come here on the spur of the moment when we heard the radio broadcast in Czechoslovakia that the Hungarians might open the border,” said the sister, Katherine Windt, “and we drove 24 hours in a row to get here.”

Most of the other arrivals on the first day of the exodus had been waiting in camps in Budapest and near Hungary’s Lake Balaton and were prepared when Sunday’s announcement was made by the Hungarian government.

Katherine Windt recalled: “We hadn’t told our parents anything, other than that we were going on vacation in Czechoslovakia.

“My brother, Volkmann, and I just kept driving on the bike--through Czechoslovakia into Budapest, and then when people said the borders were open, we headed to Austria. We are very tired,” she said, “but we made it. We are free.”

Volkmann Windt added, “We just kept quiet, got our vacation visas to Czechoslovakia and Hungary and went on our holiday. But when the chance came, we decided to take it.”

Friends in West Germany

The twins said they had friends in the prosperous southwestern West German state of Baden-Wuerttemberg and hoped to go there as soon as possible.

“Naturally, I’m concerned about the future,” said Katherine Windt. “But we are sure that everything will work out all right.”

“We really lost any hope for the future in East Germany--but we do have hope here.”

When the small cars of the refugees are waved through by Austrian border guards, they are directed by West German police to drive a mile and a half on the autobahn toward Passau and stop at the first parking area. There, various charitable organizations have set up shop.

Welfare organizations hand out printed material on what the newcomers can do--which is just about anything they wish--but also where to go for help and advice.

A member of the West German Automobile Assn. hands out maps of Germany as well as the addresses of the only two garages in the country that can repair the often-creaky East German-made Trabants and Wartburgs.

The East Germans, while free to go anywhere, are encouraged to stop at the refugee camps arranged around Passau that were constructed about 10 days ago.

The camps consist of tents, each with about 10 cots, and mess kitchens where hot meals are prepared.

They also have dozens of volunteer and government workers who process their papers--giving them new passports, identity and travel documents, 250 Deutsche marks--about $125 apiece--for spending and travel money, and tickets or gasoline to get to the more permanent relocation centers farther north in West Germany.

The East Germans can choose to stay with friends and relatives or go to the relocation centers and wait while appropriate jobs and lodgings are found for them.

In a nearby camp at Vilshofen, which has 810 beds, director Friedrich-Wilhelm Moog, an official in the Interior Ministry in Bonn, said that about 400 East Germans had arrived by noon Monday.

“We are getting everything organized, and we have no problems. We have plenty of space in the camps in Bavaria--room for 6,000 people,” Moog said. He said his staff will process the newcomers and will try to get them out of the camps in a few days.

In several camps Monday, there was a festive air, with smiling people and colored balloons bearing the legend: “Happy Welcome.”

At one border post, a red Warzburg station wagon, looking the worse for wear, rolled up with a young husband and wife, Stefan and Francesca, and their 2-year-old daughter, Lea, inside. The family declined to give their last name.

Francesca, 26, and Stefan, 29, said they were from East Berlin, where he was an engineer and she was a high school teacher--exactly the kind of professional people the Communist regime can least afford to lose.

The family said it had tried to cross the border twice from Hungary to Austria.

“We were caught by the guard the first time, and they sent us back,” Francesca said. “The second time we tried, we didn’t make it either. But the Hungarian guard didn’t send us back to East Germany. He let us go, and he said--’Next time I hope you will make it.’ We did. It’s just great, great to be here.”