Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 8, 1990 TAG: 9003082033
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A/4 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BONN, WEST GERMANY LENGTH: Medium
The resolution states that the two Germanys should adopt identical declarations saying "The Polish people are assured that their right to live in secure borders will not be questioned by us Germans through territorial claims either now or in the future."
It further says that the future government of a united Germany should sign a border treaty on the basis of those declarations.
Kohl had come under fire abroad and at home for his previous reluctance to unequivocally state that a united Germany would never lay claim to land ceded to Poland after the Third Reich's 1945 defeat.
Kohl, apparently trying to avoid offending conservative voters before federal elections in December, had insisted that only the government of a united Germany could address the matter.
His demands that a border treaty be linked to Polish concessions also caused an uproar, and he withdrew them earlier this week while at the same time proposing the resolution passed today.
In today's parliamentary debate, the opposition Social Democrats charged that Kohl's pronouncements had seriously endangered the unification process.
Party chief Hans-Jochen Vogel said "seldom has a federal chancellor . . . so mishandled" his responsibilities to West Germans "as Chancellor Kohl in the last days and weeks."
Kohl battled back by pointing out the Social Democrats' contacts with East Germany's now-disgraced Communist Party in past years.
"The Social Democrats' contribution to . . . [unification matters] . . . can be characterized as simply pathetic."
by CNB