Word: east
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...visit went off without any major embarrassments. Arriving at Schonefeld Airport on Friday, the Soviet leader was greeted with enthusiastic cries of "Gorbi! Gorbi!" but the reception remained calm. About 3,000 people gathered the next day in Alexanderplatz to demand government reform, the biggest such demonstration in East Berlin since 1953, but again the police managed to control the crowd. Officials were less successful in keeping the lid on demonstrations outside the capital: in Dresden and Leipzig violent clashes between protesters and police continued throughout the weekend...
...public statements Gorbachev walked a fine line between encouraging reform and offering support for Erich Honecker, East Germany's aged and embattled leader. Wading into a crowd with characteristic aplomb, the Soviet visitor urged patience. "Don't panic. Don't get depressed. We'll go on fighting together for socialism." He made a strong show of solidarity with Honecker, standing shoulder to shoulder with him as they reviewed a torchlight parade. When he alluded to the current crisis in a televised address, Gorbachev took pains to be circumspect. "We know our German friends well," he said. "We know their ability...
...those measured words came too late for the East Germans who had already opted to make a run for a better life in the West. Last week alone some 8,200 fled, raising the total number of refugees over the past five months to 50,000. Some jumped at the opportunity without a moment's hesitation, others agonized over it. "We talked about it way into the night for days on end," said Christiane Weinbauer of Halle, who joined the exodus with her husband last week. "One minute we had decided to go, and the next we were staying...
...enough other young men, women and children to turn a trickle of refugees into a torrent, pouring out of every crack they could find in the crumbling Iron Curtain. The first route, through Hungary, has largely shut down since East German officials cut back on exit permits to that country a month ago. Next, East Germans by the thousands planted themselves in the West German embassy in Prague, as Czechoslovakia was the only country to which they were allowed to travel without an exit permit. Those who could slip into Poland converged on Bonn's compound in Warsaw. And when...
...illegal exodus has been going on since May, when Hungary began clipping the barbed wire separating the East bloc from Austria. But nothing dramatized the crisis so vividly -- or posed the hard questions for East Germany so immediately -- as the swarm of tents packed with would-be emigres overflowing the embassy compound in Prague. Last Tuesday, after the first freedom trains had rolled out of Prague, Honecker sealed off the country's border to Czechoslovakia, leaving East Germans isolated and caged once more. There were signs late in the week, however, that restrictions on emigration might be eased, according...