Disease Spreads

The threat of a spread of the Polish disease’ is a nightmare which haunts the stalinist bureaucracies of Eastern Europe. The Husak regime in Czechoslavakia, put in power after the Soviets invaded that country in 1968, is preparing a massive show-trial of 19 supporters of Charter 77, the Czech human rights movement.

The Stalinists have ever reason to be afraid. On June [4th a new body announced its existance, slovokia. ‘Above all’, said the statement from the committee,‘we wish to defend the right of our working people, their interests and demands, their criticisms voiced at various times, during personal, discussions, at meetings, in factories and elsewhere, The majority of those arrested are prominent cultural intellectuals and accademics. The Husak regime is well aware of the important role plaved by the Polish The Preparatory Committee of intellectuals around KOR Solidarity.

According to a report of the West Berlin based Human Rights Working Group there has been intense discussion in the factories and work-places of East Germany in recent months. These have evolved around the auestion of the democratisation of the state controlled union in Union(FDGB).

In the past two months alone:

have been arrested in four big infor publicly expressing their support for Solidarity.

These arrests took place at the Cari-Zeiss- Jena works in Thurinory in Gera, at the steelworks at the Wilhelm Pieck chemical workers plant in Rudolstadr.

Detlef Abramson was imprisoned last autumn for ten months after he stated publicly that the East Germans should do as the © Poles had done In January of this year a doctor by the name of Wilhelm Koch _was a bv the East German authorities for 4 years for having contributed the