Erich Mielke demonstrations politically and giving "every DDR citizen the right to travel." On 17 October 1989, Mielke and the rest of the GDR's Politburo met to follow Gorbachev's demand, voiced in August, for Erich Honecker be removed as General Secretary of the SED and State Council chairman. Suspecting that Honecker's personal bodyguards might try to arrest the members of the Central Committee when they met to vote Honecker out in favour of Egon Krenz, Mielke saw to it that Stasi agents were stationed near the meeting room. While deliberations were underway, Mielke told Honecker that "we simply cannot start shooting with
Erich Bär Erich Bär Erich Bär (born May 23, 1916 in Dresden; died April 5, 2005) was a resistance against Nazism and later Lieutenant Colonel of Ministry of State Security (Stasi) of the GDR. He was, from 1957 to 1972 head of the executive offices of the Stasi in East Berlin. Bär, son of a worker made after Volksschule a training for tinsmith and plumber. Early on, he was active in communist organizations and was 1931-1935 a functionary in the Young Communist League of Germany. After the Nazi seizure of power Bär supported the KPD also in the underground and was charged