UDC

94(430).087

Authors

Dmitriy A. Dobrynin
P.G. Demidov Yaroslavl State University;
ul. Sovetskaya 10, Yaroslavl, 150000, Russian Federation;
e-mail: mego_krevedko@bk.ru

Abstract

Russian historiography has paid little attention to the history of the opposition movement in East Germany and the effect of human rights activism on the course of the Cold War. This article studied the publications of Amnesty International (AI), the most renowned non-governmental organization in the world, which promptly responded to the situation in the civil society of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). AI insisted on securing individual liberties, while the countries of the Soviet bloc focused on collective social and economic rights. Despite the fact that the GDR had ratified the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1973, these rights continued to be frequently violated in the country. The information about human rights abuse in the GDR was disseminated via radio, newspapers and television, not without assistance from AI. This way the details of the most resonant cases of human rights violation in the GDR became known to the world public. One of the most important events in the history of East German dissent movement was the public suicide of the Lutheran pastor Oskar Brüsewitz, who set himself on fire to protest the repression of religion. Since that moment, the democratic opposition movement started growing rapidly, which was the first step towards the fall of the Berlin Wall. On the basis of reports and newsletters of AI, the author of this paper shows that the organization’s humanitarian efforts to protect political prisoners in the GDR strengthened the opposition movement and contributed to the fall of the communist regime. In conclusion it is emphasized that the activism of the prisoners of conscience, recognized by AI, was undermining the legitimate power base of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany.

Keywords

opposition movement in the GDR, dissidents, NGOs, Amnesty International, human rights

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