Touted by the East German leadership as a barrier against "fascist provocation," the Wall was really an attempt to stop waves of skilled workers and educated people leaving a repressive state
Published:
10 November 2004 y., Wednesday
Touted by the East German leadership as a barrier against "fascist provocation," the Wall was really an attempt to stop waves of skilled workers and educated people leaving a repressive state. Around 3 million fled between 1945 and 1961, when the Wall went up. In time, it became etched in the Western consciousness as a symbol of inhumanity. More than 100 people were picked off by border guards while trying to escape; dozens of others were killed by mines.
However, by November 9, 1989, deep political shifts had prepared the ground for an earthquake. Leader Erich Honecker had been forced to resign and 4 million people had demonstrated for democracy. On that momentous day, the government's spokesman Guenther Schabowski announced that East Germans could go to West Germany if they applied for a visa.
Within minutes, people swarmed around the wall's border posts in what amounted to a siege. At midnight, they broke through to West Germany. That sounded the death knell for the Cold War and set the stage for German reunification a little more than a year later. But 15 years on, a very different kind of mass mobilisation took place. The demonstrations in Leipzig this August highlighted the economic plight of the former East German regions, where unemployment is double that of the western part.
When the old regime collapsed, many skilled workers found themselves on the wrong side of supply-and-demand economics.
Šaltinis:
euronews.net
Copying, publishing, announcing any information from the News.lt portal without written permission of News.lt editorial office is prohibited.
The most popular articles
A baby girl loses her mother at birth. A few years later, she is “sold” into domestic labor by her own father.
more »
Scarce and unevenly distributed rainfall has made water a key economic and social development issue in Morocco.
more »
Rainfall in August and September 2009 confirmed the fears of serious risk of natural disasters in years to come resulting from rising sea levels, greater erosion of coastal zones, destruction of the mangroves, and devastating floods.
more »
Fifteen years after the groundbreaking Fourth World Conference on Women, which was held in Beijing in 1995, the international community has clear legal norms on the prohibition of discrimination and the active promotion of gender equality and women's empowerment.
more »
Ahead of International Women's Day, the European Commission strengthened and deepened its commitment to equality between women and men with a Women's Charter.
more »
The World Bank Institute has launched an online multiplayer game, EVOKE, designed to empower young people all over the world, but especially in Africa, to start solving urgent social problems like hunger, poverty, disease, conflict, climate change, sustainable energy, lack of health care and education.
more »
One of the crucial questions facing EU asylum policy is the extent to which countries share the demands of asylum seekers.
more »
Youth in three major universities explored what they can do to address climate change, something that experts in a knowledge-sharing forum in Silliman University in Dumaguete City say is already at Filipinos’ doorsteps.
more »
The Parliament needs to connect more with women voters as research shows them to be trapped in a vicious circle, being under-represented in the EP and EU politics in general and, therefore, less interested and less involved than men.
more »
The streets of India became a kaleidoscope of colour, as locals celebrated Holi.
more »