Reagan calls on Gorbachev to pull down Berlin Wall. Russians denounce 'war-mongering' speechPresident Reagan yesterday challenged the Soviet leader, Mr Mikhail Gorbachev, to prove his commitment to freedoms by tearing down the Berlin Wall. He made his appeal from a podium only 50 yards from the Wall at the Brandenburg Gate.'Mr Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall,' Mr Reagan said.The Kremlin has objected to the American takeover of Berlin's 750th birthday celebrations and in particular to President Reagan's decision to speak a few hundred yards from a Soviet war memorial. His call, broadcast across the Wall to Eastern Europe, produced a loud cheer from a partisan crowd on the western side. Tass, the Soviet news agency denounced President Reagan's speech as war-mongering that ignored the reasons behind its construction. 'Reagan delivered an openly provocative, war-mongering speech, in the spirit of the times of the Cold War,' Tass said. It said he ignored the fact that it was necessary to build the wall because of hostile activities from West Berlin against East Germany.As President Reagan spoke, West Berlin was effectively an armed fortress. The nearby Tiergarten, a favourite picnic spot, was criss-crossed with coiled barbed wire and those wishing to gain a glimpse of the leader of the free world had to circumnavigate at least four barriers manned by armed guards and plainclothes policemen.'If you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe - if you seek liberalisation, come here to this gate,' the President told Mr Gorbachev. He told reporters later: 'Jericho didn't last forever. 'Thousands of Americans, mainly the families of servicemen armed with small Stars and Stripes, had been bussed in to cheer the President. They mingled with plain-clothes members of Berlin's police academy brought in to pack the audience.Even the slogan's daubed wall had been cleaned up. It now read 'welcome President Reagan 87' in a slightly wavering hand.More than 20 rioters were arrested before President Reagan's arrival after then had had looted shops and set cars on fire.Stones were thrown outside the Kadewe department store and police encircled 300 protesters for several hours before using teargas and truncheons to disperse them. Sixty people were arrested and several demonstrators were taken to hospital with injuries.The troubled district of Kreuzberg, where many young radicals of the Autonomous Movement live, was sealed off by the police last night.The White House advance team had dreamed of another kind of mishap - an attempt at a dash for freedom while Mr Reagan was speaking. 'Wouldn't it be something if there was a defection,' one aide said. 'The East Germans would have to mow them down, or let him go. We would win both ways.'President Reagan directly addressed the protesters, who flocked to the city as they had in 1982 when he last visited. 'I invite those who protest today to mark this fact,' he said. 'Because we remained strong, the Soviets came back to the bargaining table .. we have within the reach of possibility, not merely of limiting the growth of arms but of eliminating, for the first time, an entire class of nuclear weapon from the face of the earth.'He said the demonstrators were abusing freedoms they would not enjoy on the eastern side of the Wall, where a small crowd could be seen.Mr Reagan's appearance at the Bradenberg Gate was as unsettling to Berliners as the British rock concerts which sent youths on the rampage a week ago.Mr Reagan portrayed the 109-mile wall as the ultimate symbol of creative imprisonment. 'The totalitarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarthing the human impulse to create, to enjoy, to worship,' he said.US politicsUnited StatesGermanyBerlinRonald ReaganMikhail GorbachevBerlin WallAlex Brummerguardian.co.uk © 2012 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
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