Demonstration by the Polish trade union Solidarnosc in the pilgrimage city of Tschenstochau (Poland). The illegal trade union Solidarnosc grew into a mass movement that could no longer be stopped.
Source: AP Photo

Dissidents in Eastern Europe

The Czech writer Vaclav Havel was imprisoned for criticising the communist dictatorship. He then made a meagre living as a labourer, as seen here in Trutnov in 1975. He was later a member of Charta 77, which called attention to human rights violations in Czechoslovakia.
Source: picture-alliance/dpa/AFP
In the wake of tough disputes and strikes, the Polish government was forced to permit the independent trade union Solidarnosc. The strike leader Lech Walesa signed the agreement in Gdansk on 31 August 1980, but the trade union was banned again in 1981.
Source: picture-alliance/dpa/Lehtikuva Jorma Puusa
The Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn was sentenced to eight years in a labour camp for criticising the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin. He described the inhumane camps system in his book The Gulag Archipelago, and was then expelled from the Soviet Union. Arrival in Basel (Switzerland), 15 February 1974.
Source: picture-alliance/KEYSTONE/STR
The Soviet physicist Andrei Sakharov, 3 February 1980. Sakharov played a key role in developing the hydrogen bomb. In the 1960s he warned the human race of the consequences of nuclear war, founding a committee to defend human rights in 1970. He was exiled to Gorky in 1980.
Source: picture-alliance/dpa/UP

Exhibition

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