Solidarity leader Lech Walesa welcomed a Communist Party resolution on the legalization of his banned union but warned "we shall have to fight again" if no progress is made in proposed negotiations with the government.
Walesa made the comments Sunday following a two-day meeting of the Solidarity National Commission, or KKW, which agreed to accept the Communist Party offer to lift the ban on Solidarity if the union agrees to back government economic reforms, obey state laws and refuse aid from foreign sources."We answered with an outstretched hand, because such a hand was stretched out from the other side," Walesa told a crowd of 2,000 people Sunday at St. Brigida's Church in Gdansk.
"(But) we have to remain free and independent," he cautioned. "If we have it (independence), then concessions dealing with obvious problems will also appear."
Earlier, Solidarity issued a formal response to a resolution passed Wednesday by the 200-member Communist Party Central Committee calling for re-legalization of the banned trade union.
In the statement, Solidarity's first official reponse to the Central Committee action, the 21-member KKW pledged cooperation with state law "and the statutes of our union" in the national interest.
"The KKW acknowledges the resolution by the plenary session of the Central Committee on the re-establishment of union pluralism and legalization of the Solidarity Union as a substantial step toward social dialogue," the union statement said.
"A possibility for negotiations concerning Solidarity and the country's problems has appeared, (and) the KKW is of the opinion that the negotiations ought to be started as soon as possible," the statement said.
It did not specifically accept any of the conditions listed in the Central Committee's resolution, and Walesa warned that if talks with the goverment are not fruitful, "Then we shall have to fight again for what we need."
"On our side," the five-point KKW statement said, "we express the will to act according to the legal order and the statutes of our union in the spirit of the superior interest of Poland."