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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation
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certain knowledge that if I turned around and went
back to Paris without having done my utmost, I would be still more unhappy. I
went to the telephone office at the railway station to tell Serge. He has
greater confidence in me than I have, and when I am wavering I always turn to
him. In his eyes or the tone of his voice I can recognize the person I wish I
were.
On Wednesday I went back to Michael's to ask him for another
pass. Kiesinger was to speak that evening to his "dear Berliners" at the Neue
Welt, a big restaurant in Hasenheide. The place looked as if it were being
besieged. Iron gratings fenced off the sidewalks around it, and automobiles
moved at a snail's pace through the labyrinthine paths created by rolls of
barbed wire. Police, helmeted, armed with long clubs, and wearing bulletproof
vests, were stationed at all strategic points. Anti-riot firetrucks waited in
the nearby streets. All the buses had been rerouted.
Michael drove me
up to the restaurant, and the "Press" sticker on our windshield got us through.
My notebook and pen in hand, I mingled with the reporters. One of them worked
for East German television and had interviewed me several times. He exclaimed:
"So you are really going to keep your promise!"
I asked him not to say
anything.
Then, when I saw the platform, my resolution gave way to
bitter disappointment. Kiesinger and his party were seated behind a table on a
platform that was well over six feet high. The steps at each end were guarded
by strapping fellows from the Christian Democratic security force.
For
a moment I considered going up on the platform and pretending that I wanted to
ask Kiesinger for a statement, but I quickly saw that only photographers were
being allowed up there. So I found Michael and asked him for one of his
cameras, then hurried back to the platform. Two of the guards cut me off.
"Where's your photographer's pass?"
"I don't have it with me."
They pushed me aside unceremoniously, and I beat a retreat. For two
hours I sat through the session in a cold rage.
The room was jammed
with Kiesinger's supporters. No Berliners had been admitted. After distributing
free tickets in movie and theater box offices, the organizers had realized they
were being picked up by young radicals who hoped to fill the hall and then
stage a noisy demonstration. At the last minute these tickets had
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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation |
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Page 54 |
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