E. Germans Agree on Probe of Secret Police Ties

East Germany’s political leaders, confronted by tens of thousands of people in the first street protests since free elections 11 days ago, agreed Thursday to investigate alleged links between new parliamentary deputies and the former Stasi secret police.

Emerging from a virtual stalemate over the Stasi allegations, they also agreed to convene Parliament on April 5. The two main parties said they are confident of forming a non-Communist coalition government by the middle of next month.

After a meeting of the 12 parties elected to Parliament, the official news agency ADN said, “It was unanimously agreed to propose to the session that a parliamentary investigative committee (on the Stasi) be created.”

Tens of thousands of pro-democracy marchers took to the streets in East Germany in a display that was reminiscent of last October’s revolution that toppled 40 years of hard-line communism.

“We have come out in public to say we want no Stasi faction in Parliament,” Ingrid Koeppe of the reform movement New Forum said amid cheers outside the Parliament building. Similar gatherings took place all over East Germany.

Suspicions that up to 10% of the elected deputies were informers for the hated Stasi have cast doubt on the nation’s fledgling democracy.

The two largest parliamentary parties, the Christian Democrats and the Social Democrats, met earlier and said they made good progress toward forming a “grand coalition” to steer the country toward unity with Bonn.

The leaders of both parties have been caught up in the Stasi allegations. Social Democrat chief Ibrahim Boehme has stepped down until he can clear his name. Christian Democrat leader Lothar de Maiziere, East Germany’s likely next prime minister, also faces allegations concerning Stasi.