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Polish dissident movement Solidarity turns 25 A generation ago: "Those were great days that changed the world," leader Lech Walesa says By Vanessa Gera The Associated Press GDANSK, Poland - In the Gdansk shipyard, where a humble Polish electrician named Lech Walesa started a revolution 25 years ago, stands a mock food store offering a few pats of lard, some minced meat and vinegar. An old phone booth has an ''Out of Order'' sign, and a recorded woman's voice warns users that the line is tapped. The exhibit, in a shipyard that has become a shrine to communism's victims, is...

Lech Walesa Files Charges Against Station Mon Apr 11, 3:04 PM ET WARSAW, Poland - Solidarity founder and former Polish President Lech Walesa said Monday he filed charges against a radical Roman Catholic radio station that allegedly accused him of collaborating with communist authorities in the past. Walesa told PAP news agency he filed the charges with prosecutors in the northern port city of Gdansk last week in connection with comments made during a debate on Radio Maryja several weeks ago. At least one of the participants allegedly accused him of collaborating with communist authorities in the 1970s. "This is...

Saturday, April 2, 2005 3:00 p.m. EST When the white smoke curled up from the Sistine Chapel on that October evening back in 1978, it signaled that a new Pope had been chosen. His name was Karol Wojtyla. He came, as he said, from a distant land, and as he looked upon the faithful who had gathered on St. Peter's Square he offered words that would sum up his pastoral mission: "Be not afraid." Pope John Paul II died today. In the post-Berlin Wall world this man did so much to shape, it's difficult to recall the much different circumstances...

WARSAW, Poland (AP) - Wedged between troubled Ukraine and the West, Poland has plunged into the disputed Ukrainian presidential election in an attempt to mediate - a sign of anxiety over the prospect of instability and rising Russian influence so close to home. President Aleksander Kwasniewski said Nov. 25 that he would head to Kyiv at the request of Ukraine's President, Leonid Kuchma, to help broker talks between the government and the opposition led by Viktor Yushchenko, who says he was robbed of victory by a Moscow-favored candidate in the Nov. 21 runoff vote. "I have been asked by Kuchma...

The small Karnes County town of Panna Maria is expected to triple in population Sunday as it celebrates its 150th anniversary with a reception featuring former Poland President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Lech Walesa as a guest speaker. Walesa, founder of the Solidarity movement in Poland that led the country out of communism, asked to visit Panna Maria when he was invited to attend the annual convention of the Polish American Congress in Texas this year, said Loretta Niestroy of the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church. "He's never been to Panna Maria," Niestroy said. "He has been to San Antonio,...

Former US President Jimmy Carter unleashed a fierce attack against the Israeli and American governments in his speech at the Geneva Initiative's ceremony in Switzerland. Carter, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, blamed US President George W. Bush for anti-American sentiment and worldwide terror. "Bush's inordinate support for Israel allows the Palestinians to suffer," Carter said. "This is a source of anti-American sentiment in the world and encourages terror." Carter said Israel's settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and the security fence are the main obstacles to peace. He called repeatedly for the return of Palestinian refugees to the...

WARSAW (AFP) - Lech Walesa, the anti-communist trade union leader who went on to become president of Poland, received a special honour from the Warsaw government for promoting his country abroad. Walesa, 61, whose Solidarity union drove Poland's break with the former communist bloc, received a special diploma from Foreign Minister Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz. "I have always done my best to represent Poland at hundreds of meetings with thousands of participants on every continent, and I have to say, without modesty, always with success," Walesa said after receiving the award. Walesa, who was awarded the Nobel Peace prize in 1983 and...

Anybody just catch Savage ripping the Republicans for too much funeral coverage, and President Bush for a boring speech. Sheesh Michael...

GDANSK, Poland--When talking about Ronald Reagan, I have to be personal. We in Poland took him so personally. Why? Because we owe him our liberty. This can't be said often enough by people who lived under oppression for half a century, until communism fell in 1989. Poles fought for their freedom for so many years that they hold in special esteem those who backed them in their struggle. Support was the test of friendship. President Reagan was such a friend. His policy of aiding democratic movements in Central and Eastern Europe in the dark days of the Cold War meant...

REMEMBERING REAGAN In Solidarity The Polish people, hungry for justice, preferred "cowboys" over Communists. GDANSK, Poland--When talking about Ronald Reagan, I have to be personal. We in Poland took him so personally. Why? Because we owe him our liberty. This can't be said often enough by people who lived under oppression for half a century, until communism fell in 1989. Poles fought for their freedom for so many years that they hold in special esteem those who backed them in their struggle. Support was the test of friendship. President Reagan was such a friend. His policy of aiding democratic movements...

Former President of Poland Lech Walesa gave most sincere respect to President Ronald Wilson Reagan by kneeling and praying for your great president. I would like to extend my greatest thank you from my husband and me Sara to all of you and to let you know, we in Eastern Europe especially in Poland will not forget Ronald Wilson Reagan.

WARSAW, Poland - Lech Walesa, Poland's former president and founder of the Solidarity trade union that was instrumental in prying the country out of the Soviet bloc, said Tuesday he will attend the funeral of former President Reagan. "There is a debt of gratitude for everything he has done, for what we have jointly achieved," Walesa told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from his home in the Baltic port city of Gdansk. Reagan, who died Saturday at 93, was part of a stalwart group of Solidarity supporters that included former French President Francois Mitterrand and the Polish-born Pope...

The heroes of Eastern Europe's anti-communist movement yesterday denounced Fidel Castro's "Stalinist" regime in Cuba and demanded action from the West to encourage its peaceful overthrow. Lech Walesa, the former Polish president, Vaclav Havel, the former Czechoslovak president, and Arpad Goncz, the former Hungarian president, made their call in a letter to The Daily Telegraph and other leading newspapers abroad. The letter from men who were themselves victims of communist oppression will bring a furious response from the Cuban regime. It is acutely sensitive to attacks from countries which were once its closest allies. Over the past decade, it has...

<p>Throughout the papacy that began 25 years ago this day in Rome, many have underestimated Pope John Paul II. But not Leonid Brezhnev. From the start the Soviet leader seemed to appreciate that the pope's insistence on moral clarity and the primacy of the human soul was unleashing a gale force that even the Berlin Wall might not withstand.</p>

<p>LONDON &#8212; The heroes of Eastern Europe's anti-communist movement denounced Fidel Castro's "Stalinist" regime in Cuba yesterday and demanded action from the West to encourage its peaceful overthrow.</p> <p>Former Polish President Lech Walesa, former Czech President Vaclav Havel and former Hungarian President Arpad Goncz made their call in a letter to the Daily Telegraph and several other leading European newspapers.</p>

WARSAW, Poland - Former Polish President Lech Walesa, the winner of the 1983 Nobel Peace Prize, on Wednesday urged the U.N. Security Council to back a U.S.-led war on Iraq (news - web sites) and criticized the United Nations (news - web sites)' "ineffectiveness" so far. Latest news: · Iraq Shows Drone Powell Called Dangerous AP - 17 minutes ago · Britain Draws Up Six Conditions for Iraq AP - 24 minutes ago · Bush Lobbies World Leaders on Iraq Vote AP - Tue Mar 11,11:31 AM ET Special Coverage The United States and Britain are seeking support for a...

Aug 7, 2002Solidarity Founder Lech Walesa Shaves His Trademark Mustache The Associated Press WARSAW, Poland (AP) - Former Polish President Lech Walesa has shaved his signature walrus-style mustache, but he isn't saying why. Walesa was spotted with a clean-shaven face as he rode a bicycle several miles from his home in Gdansk on Wednesday. Reached by telephone at home, the former shipyard electrician joked it was his twin who was seen in town. "I was born with a mustache and I always have it," he said, refusing to discuss the subject further. Walesa's hair has turned gray since the...