European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - August 25, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse Troubles in the East. A a. A amps Scott a idler rubbish piles up at a dump South of Leipzig East dim for speedy cleanup by Ian Johnson special to the Baltimore Sun a the benefits of the recent environmental Union of East and West Germany Are not expected to appear for years and Are to Cost East germans hundreds of thousands of jobs As cd polluting factories Are closed. In addition there Are indications that East Germany will stay significantly dirtier than its Western Cousin for the foreseeable future. Nowadays much of the optimism about improving the environment has vanished. A Quot we re disappointed Quot said Helmut Schiefer Decker director of the newly founded Institute for ecological systems research in East Berlin. Quot the costs Are High but no one has the Money. The Ordinary citizen is so worried about the costs of the currency Union with West Germany that he does t have any Lime to think about the environment anymore Quot Cost estimates for a Long term cleanup rang Between $60 billion and $280 billion but the East German government is strapped for Cash and West Germany has pledged Only $300 million. A a to far the most dramatic move has been to dose about �?~10 factories in the country s Industrial Headland 3 ooh walkers out of jobs dozens of More Civ to c-., an a a a peeled to Soltow 1 he-a1 n i. a hip Lemon f in the bust go nun in a ii h. Us Sidnee D fast and a Germany a environmental Union which took effect july 1 along with the currency and economic Union. The Union sets ambitious targets for East Germany yet probably wont change its status As the dirtier half. Researchers in both Germany say. In general terms the Union Calls for East Germany to meet current West German environmental air standards by 1996 and water standards by 2000. The country is also supposed to halve its use of Brown Coal which accounts for 70 percent of its Energy production. The Coal has caused lung problems in half of the children living in Industrial areas such As Bitterfeld Leipzig Dresden and East Berlin. The plan however has been criticized for failing to set targets for cleaning up badly polluted Farmland and landfills. Up to 40 percent of East Germany s Farmland is polluted by Industry and reports that poisoned vegetables have to be destroyed have become commonplace in the East German press. Whether East Germany can meet the targets of the plan is another question. While Power plants can be cleaned up experts believe that Progress will be lost to a rapid increase in automobile traffic. Between 6 million and 7 million cars Are expected to be added to the current total of 2 million. And although West Germany is viewed As a Model in East Germany some of its Success has been at the. Expense of its neighbor. The West Berlin Institute for research on ecological economics said in a recent import shut pad of West Germany s cleaner environment impeded on nov old s largest Transf i of trash West Cut i. T. Poits 3 Milium tone of o.,-.i 3 to wed .3 mop each Yucai working women victims of unification by fan Johnson special to the Baltimore Sun Only 33, Astrid Laube feels she already has missed her Chance to have a baby. Quot i wanted to become pregnant but know t can to anymore. If i have a child now or any time in the next few years i might As Well forget about keeping my Job a Laube said. Like thousands of women across East Germany Laube has been among the hardest hit by East Germany s currency and economic Union with West Germany. Forced to work out of sheer necessity a women contribute 40 percent of a typical East German family a income a they Are losing their jobs at a disproportionately High rate and also losing their rights such As a years leave for child bearing Days off for sick children and an easily available spot at a Day care burdens of a free pres editors must think profit by Catherine Crocker associated press w Hen Lukasz Malachowski edited an influential weekly Back Home in Poland the Bottom line was maintaining journalistic integrity while avoiding the ire of communist government censors. Came the revolution and All that changed. The censors were gone but so were the government subsidies for essentials like paper and Ink. Competing for survival became the new Bottom line., Quot everything was subsidized or donated. We never had to think whether it could be sold or not now we have to think Over All these things or nobody will be Abie to survive Quot says Malachowski 35, whose Catholic weekly review essentially went broke with the change to a Market Economy. This summer Malachowski is one of 15 Eastern european journalists spending 10 weeks at american magazines like Elle rolling Stone business week family Circle and Esquire in an internship program sponsored by the . Government and the magazines. The interns seasoned journalists in their mid-30s from Bulgaria Czechoslovakia East Germany Hungary. Poland and Romania have come to the United states to learn How a free and competitive press works. Quot they have to learn to operate a Magazine As a business Quot says Anne Sutherland Fuchs senior vice president and publisher of Elle who organized the Magazine Industry s role in the internship program. Quot they Haven t been faced with circulation decisions subscription pricing decisions. Advertising rates. Everything has been dictated a whether it s the kind of paper they print on or How Many copies they print Quot she says Quot it s a whole different Ball game when its a free press sitting in his cubicle at Elle Magazine Peter Janes sos 41, loaded through a copy of Kepes 7 Lulu a de wee the hungarian family weekly of which he s. Deputy in chief. The first advertisement m �1 Pace Magazine appeared in Page 30, it pm Pavini ,./ i. To an Issue of 1 him a. E Tod ii g a by Page hied wan. A Laube a bookkeeper and a workers representative to management has seen 500 of the former 5,000 employees at the Narva Light bulb factory lose their jobs. Another 1,500 Are expected to go by the end of the year. Most of those being fired Are Low level White Collar and Assembly line workers a in other words. Mostly women. A nationally the trend of an unusually High number of women losing their jobs is growing. Of the 272,000 unemployed registered in july 51,3 percent were women although they make up 49 percent of the total employment Force. While the difference is not yet startling it has been growing rapidly for several months arid is expected to become even greater. Quot Many of the positions that women have Are the first to be Cut. And Many of the industries in which women traditionally work textiles and food for example Are the least competitive and will close Down a said Edelgard Woythe head of the employment office in the East Berlin District of Prenzlauer Berg the Reader to buy expensive cosmetics designer clothing glamorous perfumes and Chic accessories. Quot at first i thought the Quality of advertisements is not the Job of the editor but the Job of the advertiser Quot says sos a Burly chooses his English words carefully. Quot i talked about it with Anne Fuchs and she said 1 would never take Tho advertisement of x Here on the first pages because it s not Beautiful enough Quot tire Eastern european journalists Admire the sleek look of their Host publications their advertising knowhow and technical expertise. Above All they Admire the huge sums of Money that go into making the magazines. They Are also fiercely proud of their magazines at Home. But this Pride goes hand in hand with a deep frustration about their financial and technical limitations Gyorgyi Kocsis 36, an intern at business week helped found a weekly economic Magazine 12 years ago in Budapest Hungary. It broke new ground in up to Date critical reporting at a time when most publications were mouthpieces for the government. Avg the hungarian initials for world Economy. Weekly became Quot a very popular Quality Magazine in Hungary Quot says Kocsis. But in the last two years she adds As new newspapers and magazines hit the Market it lost 15 percent of its readership and suffered an Quot identity she pointed on her cluttered desk at business week to a recent Issue of her Magazine. The cover shows pieces of paper representing Stock shares coming out of factory chimneys. The illustration is in Black and White and the paper on which it is printed is rough. Quot some of our ideas on the cover gags pictures can be on any world Magazine. But i have to look with a looking Glass because the printing is so awful Quot says Kocsis. He go a look suffers badly in comparison to Quot Al the Beautiful magazines on the newsstand suddenly unable to contain her frustration she gestures toward her Magazine and exclaims Quot now hate it a a but As the Eastern european magazines get Slicker and fatter with advertisements and censorship becomes a thing of the past even journalists who Are ardent supporters of a free Market Economy feel a bittersweet twinge As their old world collapses. The Quot family business Quot atmosphere at avg probably i disappear Kocsis says wistfully. Quot Pio Bobly it will be More professional arid big and t of will lose this tooling we area to he a nows factory which con he Good and i j or goo a v. A fuse ids East German women at work in a factory the change is apparent in the waiting room outside Woythe a office where dozens of women sit patiently for a usually discouraging talk with an adviser a year ago the office had 500 Job seekers a month and usually found them a place within two weeks. Now there Are 500 a Day and few open spots Quot they done to want women. Old women will retire soon and Young ones will have children. If you have Young children there in t a Chance anymore Quot said Sabine Schenk a researcher with the Institute for sociology at the East Berlin Humboldt University. The new situation is hard for Many women to get used to. Unlike their counterparts across the German Border East German women Are used to working. Nearly 83 percent do so. 33 percent More than in West Germany. Now however Woythe said Many will have to stay Home not Only because the jobs Aren t there but because companies Are slashing Day care centers and other formerly mandatory services in a bid to Cut costs and stay competitive. Quot i m afraid Many women will have to gel used to the typical West German homemaker existence ill Tell you something they done to like the idea Quot Woythe said the danger hat women Are being especially disadvantaged has attracted the attention of the european parliament which released a report last month pointing out the dangers of putting women out of work and at the same time limiting their rights. Structural economic changes will hit women the hardest and replace once adequate jobs with Low paying and insecure sen ice sector jobs the report said. Laube views All these changes with a feeling she never had before. She said Quot i was always Happy to be a woman but now i wish i were a i hate these foreigners new York times w Ith the 1990 figure for foreigners applying for Asylum in West Germany passing the 100,000 Mark and hundreds of thousands of East germans and ethnic germans from farther East in Europe jamming into the country feelings against non germans and non West germans Are rising. You can hear it from some West German politicians and in Bonn s subways where natives find themselves sharing space with iranians sikhs arabs africans and romanian gypsies All clearly identifiable by their chador turbans Dell Abas veils and other native dress. The East germans Are not nearly so conspicuous. But the locals seem to recognize them instantly. A White haired woman with a Cane berated some noisy German youngsters in a subway car the other Day then turned to no one in particular and declared Quot i can t stand these people from East Germany they should stay Home. I never did like on the same line the next morning an elderly German woman turned with a look of disdain away from empty seats adjacent to several dark skinned passengers and sat Down next to a White passenger Quot i despise these foreigners Quot she said. Quot but i am a foreigner too Quot the seatmate said. Quot yes Quot she said. Quot but you Are not dark a that sentiment in a country where the population density is already one of the highest in Europe can be encountered in More intense forms in towns whore Asylum seekers have been crowded mho Camps one of those is in lob a town of 7 263 m the a Quot. I.-. I a t a a i. A Quot i i i cd since 1958 for Asylum seekers and germans lion outside the country being res called. All went Well with the foreigners unlit now. A. A for weeks the Camp with a capacity of 1,300, has been Homo to Neaily twice that number the majority of them gypsies from Romania and tensions with the townsfolk have sharpened. After complaining of rampant shoplifting by flip refugees shopkeepers and Bankers started closing their doors. Barbed wire was put around the town swimming Pool to present Camp people from bathing there. The police chief complained that gypsies had entered his House and stolen property Richard Dewes Secretary for social affairs in the Saar state government said he had encountered Quot naked hatred Quot when he tried to discuss the problems created by the Asylum seekers with Lebach residents last week. The situation in Lebach has prompted the Saar governor Oskar Lafontaine who is also the social democratic candidate for Chancellor of West Germany to join politicians from other parties in proposing restrictive changes in the Federal Republic s Laws on Asylum. In principle any foreigner May seek political Asylum in West Germany although currently about 97 percent of the applicants Are considered to Lack Clear evidence of eligibility but the Law permits them to stay until their applications have been processed by administrative courts and. Other Legal authorities which can to a matter of. Months or even years. In july the number of applicants Tor Asylum was 18,855, an increase of 41 percent Over the number in june. Waves of Asylum seekers seem to be Corning from Ever new directions. In july it was the 3,200 albanians who stormed into the West German embassy in Tirana subsequently obtaining free passage out of their communist ruled country this month it scorns to be people from Lebanon Turkey and Bulgaria. The Asylum question would make Good material in the National election Campaign that is just getting under Way rut at the moment Bonn politicians Are so pm occupied with issues surrounding uni i motion of i ast and Best gum Jim Issue h on j us i j j 1 1 a a a Rui l 81 ars and Girini l 1000 us Taj a
