Leipzig Vows Talks After 70,000 Protest : E. German Officials Show New Tolerance for Demonstrators

BERLIN —  In an unprecedented move, Leipzig officials promised today to push for talks between the opposition and Communist leaders after allowing 70,000 protesters to jam the city center in East Germany’s largest protest in decades.

At the same time, 20 pro-reform demonstrators held talks with the mayor of Dresden, scene of the country’s worst political violence in decades, and agreed to more discussions.

The official tolerance of Monday night’s peaceful march for an end to authoritarian rule contrasted sharply with the violence police used to break up similar demonstrations over the weekend in six East German cities.

But despite the new tolerance in Leipzig and Dresden, East German leader Erich Honecker gave no indication that he is about to change his government’s course.

In a meeting with Chinese Vice Premier Yao Yilin today, he compared the pro-democracy uprising in China with the unrest in East Germany and criticized what he said was a campaign to defame the Communist countries.

“Any attempt of imperialism to destabilize the socialist construction or to slander its successes and achievements is now, and will be in the future, nothing other than fruitless charging of Don Quixote against the ever-moving blades of a windmill,” the official news agency ADN quoted Honecker as saying.

ADN said Honecker and Yao recalled the events of last June in Beijing, when troops crushed the Chinese pro-democracy movement.

“In this respect, there is a fundamental lesson to be learned from the counterrevolutionary revolt in Beijing and the present defamation campaign against the GDR (East Germany) and other Socialist states,” ADN said.

That statement appeared to signal Honecker’s willingness to crush dissent, if necessary.

Also today, Manfred Stolpe, deputy director of the Lutheran Church Federation, said there are “working groups” of government and church officials discussing the unrest in East Germany.

But he denied a West German radio report that said high-level talks had been held between church leaders and government officials.