100,000 Surge Through Leipzig to Urge Reform

The biggest demonstration in East Germany in decades took place Monday night in the southern city of Leipzig as at least 100,000 opposition activists surged through the streets after peace services in five Protestant churches.

They crowded into Karl Marx Square in the center of East Germany’s second-largest city as part of a mass effort to urge the hard-line Communist regime to introduce political and economic reforms.

“We are the people” and “Give young people power,” they chanted. Some carried banners calling for free elections, unrestricted travel and a free media. Breaking with tradition, the official East German news agency ADN, a radio station and the main television evening news program all carried accounts of the demonstration.

Police did not interfere with the marchers, staying on the sidelines as they did last week during a similar gathering, when the turnout was estimated at 50,000. The estimated number of people in the street Monday night made it the biggest protest since worker riots in 1953, which were suppressed by Soviet tanks.

Meanwhile, in Warsaw, the East German Embassy reversed its policy and began giving East Germans travel documents enabling them to emigrate to West Germany. At least 1,300 East Germans are in the Polish capital waiting for transportation that would allow them to join an exodus of refugees to the West.

The East Berlin regime had insisted that these citizens be sent back through East Germany so they could be officially “expelled” as undesirable. The tactic backfired, however, when hundreds of other East Germans tried to jump on board the westbound trains.

On Monday, officials at the East German Embassy began handing out emigration papers to their countrymen. Ambassador Juergen van Zwoll personally met the first two busloads of East Germans when they arrived.

“The East German government found a solution for those East German citizens who are in Poland by issuing them a certificate of renunciation of citizenship and providing them with an identification paper,” Van Zwoll said.

He said that “these people can go to whatever country they wish--their further destination does not interest us.”

Several East Germans confirmed that they were required to sign a certificate renouncing their citizenship and that they were then given new identification papers.

“We are stateless people,” one said as he left the embassy.

Not for long, however. The first group of East Germans to call at their embassy moved quickly on to the West German Embassy, where they were given travel documents and then prepared to depart for West Germany. West Germany recognizes only a single German citizenship.

An official with the Polish airline LOT said the airline had received inquiries from the West German Embassy about chartering flights to West Germany, and a spokesman for the West German airline Lufthansa said his company is ready to fly the refugees out if called on to do so.

In another development, Austrian police said Monday that about 1,800 East Germans crossed the border from Hungary en route to West Germany in the previous 24 hours. About 36,000 East Germans have crossed into Austria from Hungary since Sept. 11, when Hungary opened its border to the refugees.

In East Germany, members of the reform-minded group Democratic Awakening demanded in an open letter to East Berlin Mayor Erhard Krack that the state undertake an inquiry into police beatings of demonstrators during celebrations 10 days ago marking the 40th anniversary of the East German state.

The letter said hundreds of citizens have complained that they were humiliated and mistreated for more than 24 hours, adding: “Violence and intimidation are not suitable conditions for the democratic dialogue all sides are seeking.”