Word: christian
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...signs of East Germany's icy displeasure were unmistakable. Bound for East Berlin on a private visit, West German Christian Democratic Party Leader Helmut Kohl and three aides last weekend routinely handed over their passports at the Friedrichstrasse checkpoint near the Berlin Wall; there a squad of gray-coated Grenzpolizei, the Communist border guards, brusquely barred their way. Kohl had crossed the Wall several times in the past, but this time he was forced to wait at the checkpoint for an hour and then was told that his visit was "undesirable." Although the Bonn government protested that the East...
...easy solution is in sight for the Christian Democrats...
...Premier Giulio Andreotti, who then headed a center-right coalition made up of his Christian Democrats and the conservative Liberal Party, lost 13 consecutive parliamentary votes before calling it quits. This time Andreotti's 18-month-old government did not so much fall as dissolve. To avoid a showdown vote that would have poisoned the atmosphere and left the parties in a state of political war, he bowed out quietly, imploring his party to exercise "general prudence...
There was good reason for his discretion. The challenge facing Italy is a forceful, intensified demand by the Communists for a direct role in an emergency government that would deal with Italy's mounting economic, labor and law-and-order problems. The Christian Democrats' dilemma: find a compromise that would give the Communists new power in governing Italy, however that role might be disguised, or face the trauma of another early national election that would further polarize the country...
...stage for Andreotti's resignation was set last month with the collapse of the six-party programmatic accord by which the Communists and four other nonruling parties abstained on key votes and thus kept the minority Christian Democratic Cabinet afloat. Three parties, led by the Communists, then demanded formation of a multiparty emergency government. The tiny (four seats) Radical Party, which specializes in goading both the Christian Democrats and the Communists, subsequently called for a parliamentary debate on the government. The Communists passed the word that if Andreotti did not resign first, they would introduce a motion of noconfidence...