Peter Rösch (civil rights activist)

Peter Rösch, Photo: Frank Ebert (Robert Havemann Society)

Peter Rösch (born October 15, 1953 in Jena ; † May 17, 2017 in Berlin ) was a GDR civil rights activist .

Life

Rösch grew up in Jena and learned the profession of precision mechanic and worked as such in the research workshop of the medicine department of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena . He hitchhiked to many rock and blues concerts and was nicknamed "bubble" by his friends. For political reasons, he was denied participation in a high school diploma. From 1973 to 1982 he was significantly involved in campaigns and GDR-wide networking of the “open work” of the young community in Jena-Stadtmitte. His identity card was withdrawn several times.

In 1976 he took part in the protest of Jena opposition members against the expatriation of the songwriter Wolf Biermann and was arrested and interrogated. The MfS then carried out the operation "jellyfish" against him and other active members of the young community of Jena-Stadtmitte. Between 1978 and 1979 the conscientious objector had been called up as a construction soldier and for the last two months he was arrested in a Bautzen barracks in solitary confinement. The death of his friend Matthias Domaschk at the Stasi had a lasting impact on his life. On April 10, 1981, he was traveling with Domaschk to a birthday party in East Berlin . The SED's 10th Party Congress took place on the same weekend . Rösch and Domaschk were arrested and taken to the Stasi remand prison in Gera . Domaschk died here under circumstances that have not yet been clarified.

In 1982 Peter Rösch emigrated to West Berlin and worked there since 1983 in the Deutsches Technikmuseum as a restorer, later also as a staff council. He undertook lecture tours on the subject of "Peace and Opposition Groups in the GDR" through the Federal Republic, the Netherlands and Denmark and participated in the working group "Berlin and Germany Policy" of the Alternative List . Together with Jürgen Fuchs and Roland Jahn, he actively supported the opposition movement in the GDR and provided them with information, books and printing materials. After the Peaceful Revolution, he moved to the eastern part of the city in 1992 and founded the citizens' committee “15. January ”for the dissolution of the Ministry for State Security and the Jena history workshop . From 1992 to 2002 he was editor of the review magazine Horch und Guck .

literature

• Henning Pietzsch: Youth between Church and State. History of church youth work in Jena 1970–1989. European dictatorships and their overcoming, 5, Böhlau-Verlag Cologne, Weimar, Vienna 2005, ISBN 3-412-17204-9 History of Church Youth Work Open Work Jena 1970–1989 (PDF; 3.1 MB).
• Jürgen Fuchs: You set the pace, Matthias. In: Horch und Guck, magazine of the Citizens Committee “15. January “e. V. 12th year, special issue I, 2003, pp. 26–32.
• Interview by Gerold Hildebrand with Peter Rösch: "Dzierzynski would have shot you right in the courtyard" In: Listen and Look. 12th year, special issue I, 2003 Article on the net .
• Gerold Hildebrand: Matthias Domaschk - a turbulent and unfinished youth in Jena In: Listen and look. 12th year, special issue I, 2003 ( Memento from January 7th 2011 in the Internet Archive )
• Freya Klier : Matthias Domaschk and the Jena Resistance. (PDF; 7.3 MB), Bürgerbüro e. V. - Association for the processing of consequential damage caused by the SED dictatorship, Berlin 2007, out of print, new edition by Polymathes Verlag Leipzig, ISBN 978-3-942657-02-0 .

Web links

• Obituary for Peter Rösch. In: havemann-gesellschaft.de
• Funeral speech from June 30, 2017 (PDF) by Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk . In: havemann-gesellschaft.de
• Peter Rösch. In: jugendopposition.de
• Peter Rösch. In: zeitzeugenbuero.de
• Hello bubble. In: Der Spiegel . February 14, 1983
• Interview with Peter Rösch. In: Thüringische Landeszeitung. April 7, 2011
• Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk : The "counter strike" - a terrific own goal. In: Federal Commissioner for the Stasi Records .
• Erik de Graaf: Obituary for bubble Jena, GDR - 5 januari 1982

Individual evidence

1. ^ Thomas Stridde: Jenenser GDR civil rights activist Peter Rösch died. In: Ostthüringer Zeitung . Mediengruppe Thüringen Verlag GmbH, May 19, 2017, accessed on May 20, 2017 . 
2. ↑ Peter Rösch. In: jugendopposition.de. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
3. ↑ ^{a b} Peter Rösch (bubble), Berlin - “No power for nobody” In: zeitzeugenbuero.de. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
4. ↑ Gerold Hildebrand: Matthias Domaschk - a turbulent and unfinished youth in Jena In: Horch und Guck. 12th year, special issue I, 2003 ( Memento from January 7th 2011 in the Internet Archive )
5. ↑ Matthias Domaschk's death: contemporary witnesses doubt suicide. In: Thüringische Landeszeitung . March 27, 2017. Retrieved May 20, 2017.