APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110020-1
- October
- Yugoslavia recognizes East Germany; first nonbloc state to do so.
1958
- February
- Purge begins of leading Communist functionaries who oppose pace of Ulbricht's economic policies; party and government reorganized.
- November
- East and West Germany formalize commercial relations by signing Interzonal Trade Agreement, which for years serves as principal official link between them.
1959
- May-August
- Big Four foreign ministers meet at Geneva in futile attempt to work out formula for German unification; East and West represented as "advisors."
1960
- April
- Government undertakes drive to complete agricultural collectivization.
- September
- Upon death of Wilhelm Pieck, office of president abolished; Council of State created as replacement with SED chief Ulbricht elected chairman.
1961
- July-August
- East German refugees to West Berlin and West Germany reach highest number since 1953; 33,415 in July and 47,433 in August.
- August
- Escapes virtually stopped by erection of Berlin wall and by strengthening of defenses on East-West German demarcation line.
1962
- January
- Universal military training law passed.
- August
- Would-be defector Peter Fechter shot and allowed to bleed to death at the Berlin wall in highly published instance of East German brutality.
1963
- June
- Ulbricht proposes and later (February 1964) spells out New Economic System which places emphasis on such factors as profitability, realistic price-cost relationships, greater outlays for research, material incentives for workers, and increased managerial responsibility.
- August
- Nuclear Test Ban Treaty signed by East Germany.
- December
- West Berlin and East German authorities conclude first Berlin Pass Agreement whereby West Berlin citizens visit relatives in East Berlin.
1964
- June
- Soviet-East German Treaty of Friendship and Mutual Assistance signed.
- September
- Premier Otto Grotewohl dies and is succeeded by Willi Stoph.
1965
- April
- Soviet and East German military forces harass West German civilian and Allied military traffic to West Berlin in retaliation for West German Bundestag meeting in West Berlin.
- September
- Ulbricht leads high-level delegation to Moscow to receive support for GDR claims to international recognition of its sovereign status; marks beginning of more intensive Soviet-GDR bilateral relations.
- October
- Youth riots occur in Leipzig and other East German cities.
- December
- SED leaders criticize youth and cultural policies at 11th plenum of the SED Central Committee; subsequent return to hardline cultural policy produces many incidents between regime and intellectuals during 1966.
- Erich Apel, head of the State Planning Commission, commits suicide in spectacular act of protest against Soviet economic demands on East Germany.
1966
- March
- In bid for international recognition, East Germany applies for U.N. membership through Polish offices.
1967
- February
- Nationality law enacted by People's Chamber establishes for first time concept of "citizens of GDR" as distinct from "German nationality."
- Warsaw Pact Foreign Ministers discuss bilateral relations with West Germany; East Germans, Poles against; Czechs, Bulgarians, Hungarians favor.
- March-September
- GDR seeks to shore up opposition to Bonn; signs 20-year bilateral treaties with Poland and Czechoslovakia (March), Hungary (May), and Bulgaria (September).
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110020-1
