APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110019-3
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FIGURE 8. The East German regime provides a relative abundance of consumer goods and food to the shops of East Berlin. Shown is a clothing shop on the Rathausstrasse (top) and a food market on Leninplatz (below). (U/OU)
(KPD) and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) failed outright in West Berlin; both organizations were eventually licensed by the Kommandatura to operate in all parts of the city, and the SPD continued as a separate organization in East Berlin until 1961. In East Germany the SPD disappeared as a separate entity in 1948.
With the breakdown of Four-Power collaboration in 1948, two separate political systems evolved. A mass meeting organized by the Communists on 30 November 1948 installed a new government in East Berlin. Since that time the Soviet Sector has in practice operated as an integral part of the East German political administrative system. The separate character of East Berlin was dramatized by the erection of the Berlin Wall which enforced a drastic curtailment on the movement of people between the Soviet Sector and the three Allied Sectors in West Berlin. Actual East German control over East Berlin was asserted even more forcefully in August 1962 when an East German Kommandatura replaced the Soviet city command. In contravention of agreements that only military personnel of the Four Powers would be permitted in Berlin, substantial East German military forces now operate in the city. A few remnants of Four-Power status exist, however, notably the right of Western military patrols to visit East Berlin "without control" by East German authorities. These patrols, and all other foreign nationals, enter East Berlin only through Checkpoint Charlie, one of the several crossing points which exist between East and West Berlin. As a result of the agreement signed between the West Berlin Senat and the East German Government on 20 December 1971, the number of crossing points for West Berliners was increased to 15.
The government of East Berlin consists of a city council (Magistrat) of 18 members, headed by a Lord Mayor (Oberburgermeister). Only two men have
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200110019-3
