Word: walesa
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During the following weeks, Polish authorities stepped up their surveillance of the restive labor leader. The day after the announcement of the Solidarity meeting. Walesa was forcibly taken from his home to a nearby militia station, where he was detained and interrogated for five hours. Later that week his wife and his chauffeur were also called in for questioning...
...April 25, Aloian heard from his journalist contact. He had met with Walesa during the previous week, the intermediary reported, and the union leader gave him definite word that he would not be coming to Harvard's Commencement. With that news, says Aloian, he and his colleagues began searching for a replacement speaker, and before long they had secured an acceptance--directly, unambiguously, and in English--from the Mexican author and diplomat Carlos Fuentes...
...aftermath of the whole saga, observers of Eastern European affairs remain split about the implications of Harvard's invitation to Walesa. Some argue that the gesture, though fruitless, carried symbolic significance. "I think it's a very good thing Harvard invited him," says Jeri Laber, executive director of the Helsinki Watch Committee, a prominent human rights monitoring group. "It's important that there be as much support in the West as possible for anyone who's the subject of as much harassment as he is. The more invitations like this the better...
Szafar of the Russian Research Center concurs, saying. "This kind of demonstration shows Walesa's not forgotten, even if Polish affairs are out of the headlines--it produces a feeling of solidarity with the Polish workers' movement. I'm very glad Harvard did decide to extend the invitation, no matter what the outcome...
Moreover, notes Brantley, also a professor of international law at Tufts's Fletcher School of Diplomacy, it is unlikely that the Harvard offer affected Walesa's stature simply because it went virtually unnoticed in the Polish press. "It received minimal, minimal coverage," she says, adding that even the underground newspapers "had more important things to cover...