August 17, 1962: Peter Fechter killed by GDR border troops   By Patrick van Schie   Peter Fechter bleeds to death on the wrong side of the Wall The young East Berlin construction worker Peter Fechter became world famous because of his flight to freedom. More than a year after the construction of border barriers […]

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Beata Bruggeman-Sekowska   When the Polish government under Edward Gierek introduced new food price increases in the summer of 1980 and Poland faced big international debt and shortages of supplies, a wave of labor unrest was stirred in the country. In July a series of strikes started in Lublin and on 14 August 1980 a […]

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