Students Supporting Solidarity Host Forum for Polish Emigres

A three-day series of activities designed to bring the condition of Polish dissidents to the attention of Harvard students began last night with a panel discussion among ex-prisoners of the Polish regime.

The forum, sponsored by the four-month-old Harvard-Radcliffe Students Supporting Solidarity (HRSSS), featured seven ex-officials of the labor union Solidarity who had been interned in Poland under martial law.

Appearing before an audience of about 100 in the Boylston Auditorium, the panelists described--in Polish, through an interpreter--instances of repression under the Communist regime in Poland, including the jailing of thousands of political prisoners.

"The difference between workers' democrary and Polish democracy is the difference between a chair and an electric chair," said Marek Konka, vice president of the National Coordinating Committee of Solidarity.

Walean

In Poland yesterday, Solidarity's leader, Lech Walesa, who has been invited by Harvard to deliver the Commencement address, was seized by police at his Gdansk apartment and released five hours later.

Konka said that Walesa "will not come" to Harvard in June because the Polish government would not let him return to Poland, but predicted that the labor activist will send a written speech.

He added that news of Harvard's invitation was spread throughout Poland by Solidarity's underground press.

Last night's discussion kicked off a three-day effort by the HRSSS to solicit signatures in College dining halls for three petitions in support of Polish political prisoners.

One letter calls for the release of all "prisoners of, conscience" in Poland, especially university and high school students who were imprisoned for illegally leafleting.

The others asked the Polish government to free two union activists who have been imprisoned in violation of international law, a spokesman for HRSSS said yesterday.

She added that the group hopes to collect at least 1000 signatures by Friday night, before it mails copies of the petitions to the Polish Embassy and the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva.

An organizer of the drive said yesterday that "mentioning the names of specific people in the petitions protects them from harm because the Polish government knows someone outside is watching them."

In addition, the letters let the prisoners know that Americans are concerned with their situation, she added.

Other Activities

The HRSSS plans to follow the petition to campaign with a drive to collect used clothing and send it to Poland later this spring. Members said the plans were prompted by deteriorating economic conditions in Poland.

The group will also participate in a rally in downtown Boston on May 1 in response to a call by Solidarity for sympathy demonstrations, Beth Holmgren, a fifth-year graduate student in the Slavic Department and a member of HRSSS said yesterday.