appeal of the thirteen intellectuals, one of the statements in defense of the workers victimized by repression after the June 25 events. It was issued after the trials of workers who had participated in the protests against the price increases decreed by the government. Last July 20 sentence was pronounced in the trial before the Warsaw regional tribunal of seven participants in a workers demonstration which had taken place June 25 at the Ursus tractor factory near Warsaw. Those who had taken part in this demonstration, one of the largest ever to occur in Poland, the aim of which was to protest against a massive increase in prices, were sentenced to prison terms of up to three years. This trial was held under conditions that violate the principle of public trials, Only the families of the accused had the right to enter the courtroom, access to which was completely forbidden to foreign journalists os well as many intellectuals and students who came to try to enter. These workers were accused of having taken "an active part in acts of hooliganism. " All the defense attorneys were court-appointed. At the same time in Radom there was a trial of people who had participated in a mass demonstration. These defendants were sentenced to prison terms of up to ten years. Further, the press announced that new trials would be held. We feel obligated to oppose qualifying what are in fact workers protests against the unjust social policies and authoritarian methods of the regime as acts of "hooliganism. " We must forcefully stress that the responsibility for violations of rights that occurred during the events in Ursus and other cities of Poland falls upon the administration, which through its behavior has undermined the major forms of workers democracy, reduced to nothing the workers councils that were created in 1956, and transformed the trade unions into dead and fictitious bodies subjected to the apparatus of the regime. We believe that if such tragic events are to be avoided in the future, it is indispensable to grant the workers the rights they deserve and not to resort to repression.
In the article on the Swedish elections published in the previous issue of INPRECOR (No.59,
October 7), the first sentence on page 15 reads: "The optimism results from the fact that the bourgeoisie has been working for an election victory over the labor parties for forty-four years now. " The sentence should have said that the bourgeois parties have been working for such a victory. Otherwise the special sort of collaboration between big capital and the Social Democratic government, as well as the bourgeoisie's lack of enthusiasm for a change in government,
POLAND The struggle of the Polish nation for these rights, which was also manifested in many protests against the reform of the constitution, is a struggle for democratic socialism, which, according to Marx, *is the opposite of all relafions in which man is a humiliated being, an abandoned or despised slave. We are conscious of the fact that Polish public opinion cannot hear our voice through normal channels, even though we are convinced that what we say expresses the sentiments of the majority of the Polish community. That is why we address ourselves, through the vehicle of our editorial board, to all those struggling for the rights of the workers, which are on integral part of human rights, to all those who have taken up defense of the persecuted in Chile and Spain, in Czechoslovakia and the USSR. We launch the following appeal: Come to the aid of the Polish workers in prison. Reports we have received from the prisons and police stations indicate that the security organs have used physical force during interrogations. In addition, it is universally known that workers suspected of having participated in the demonstracorrection is obscured. 14 tions have been laid off in great numbers. This represents a danger to the material existence of these workers and their families. We oddress ourselves to Jean-Paul Sartre, André Malraux, Pierre Emmanuel, Louis Aragon, Jean-Marie Domenach, Claude Roy, Jean Daniel, Laurent Schwartz. We address ourselves to Gunther Grass, Heinrich Ball, Arthur Miller, Saul Bellow, Eugenio Montale, Ignazio Silone, Stephen Spencer, and Robert Conquest. We address ourselves to all those who solidarize with the struggle of the workers of the entire world for the liberation of labur. Demand the release of the participants in the workers protest in Poland. Signers: Stanislaw Baranczak, poet of the young generafion; Jacek Bochenski, writer; Kazimierz Brandys, writer, Stefan Kisielewski, writer and Catholic publicist; Andrzej Kijowski, writer and publicist; Ryszard Krynicki, economist; E. Lipinski, protessor; Jan Josef Lipski, literature critic and historian; Adam Michnik, historian; Halina Mikolajska, actress; Marek Nowakowski, writer; Julian Stryikowski, writer; Jan Ziejo, priest.