Word: gdansk
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Marching behind a 10-ft. wooden crucifix, 500 workers last week ended their nine-day occupation of Gdansk's Lenin Shipyard -- and with it Poland's most serious outbreak of labor unrest in seven years. The strikers failed to win any of their demands, which included a 40% pay increase and recognition of the now banned Solidarity trade union. "We are not leaving the shipyard in triumph," declared the strike committee. "But we are leaving with our heads high...
...used eventually. In the end, they were. Attacking in the dead of night, more than 2,000 riot police and elite commandos routed several hundred occupying strikers at the Nowa Huta steel mill near Cracow, reportedly injuring at least 40 of them. Meanwhile, police surrounded the more recently occupied Gdansk shipyard, isolating a strike force of about 1,000, which included Lech Walesa, legendary founder of the outlawed Solidarity independent trade union...
...midweek the crisis seemed to be abating. The Catholic bishops authorized five prominent laymen to serve as mediators in the dispute, evidently with the government's consent. But by the time the laymen arrived at Nowa Huta and Gdansk, the course of action was about to change drastically...
...hours after the storming of Nowa Huta, riot police and militia began cordoning off the shipyard in Gdansk, which had been occupied by as many as 3,000 striking workers for the previous three days. The plant management broadcast an announcement warning nonstriking employees, some of whom had continued to report to work, to remain at home until further notice. As the morning wore on, crowds of curious onlookers gathered behind police lines at the main shipyard gate, near the steel monument of three crosses erected by Solidarity in memory of workers killed in antigovernment protests there in 1970. Inside...
...week's end strike leaders and shipyard managers in Gdansk entered into church-mediated negotiations. While pay raises and amnesty for strikers were discussed, the effort seemed designed primarily to save face on both sides. Whatever comes of the talks, Poland still faces grave challenges ahead. The government has demonstrated that it can contain major outbreaks of worker dissent, but only by means that are likely to provoke more trouble in the future. The workers have managed to deliver a message of defiance and rage, but they are not able to transform it into political gains. In the empty space...