Negotiations
Negotiations between the authorities and rebels began almost immediately, as was becoming the custom with prisoner disturbances, but were from the beginning wrought with difficulty. The camp authorities again immediately acquiesced to virtually all of the prisoners demands, but this time, with the past deceit still fresh in their minds, the prisoners did not accept this solution as sufficient and demanded a written agreement. A draft was written up by the authorities, passed around the camp and widely panned. From here negotiations cooled until higher-ranking officers came in from other cities. Solzhenitsyn explained:
| “ | Golden-epauleted personages, in various combinations, continued coming in the camp to argue and persuade. They were all allowed in, but they had to pick up white flags and undergo a body search. They showed the generals around, let them talk to prisoners, and called big meetings in the Camp Divisions for their benefit. Their epaulets flashing, the bosses took their seats in the presidium as of old, as though nothing were amiss. | ” |
To these generals and others were presented the same set of demands: punishment of the soldiers responsible for the murder of various prisoners and beating of women prisoners; that prisoners who had been transferred to other camps as punishment for participating in a strike be brought back; that prisoners no longer had to wear degrading number patches or be locked into their dormitories at night; that the walls separating camp divisions (namely between the men's and women's camps) not be rebuilt; that an eight-hour work day be instituted; that limits be taken off the number of letters they could send and receive; that certain hated camp guards and officials be removed from Kengir; and that, most importantly, their cases be reviewed.
None of these demands were unconstitutional. The original regulation specifically provided for all that the prisoners were asking, and that a simple reinstatement of those rights was all that was being requested.
The generals, now with Sergei Yegorov, deputy chief of the MVD, and Ivan Dolgikh, division commander of Gulag, among them, once again agreed to the prisoners demands as whole, but, still failing to match a written contract to their words, they were once again rejected by the prisoners.
The discussions then further broke down into threats and counter-threats. The prisoners, out of a lack of trust in their current negotiating partners, demanded that a member of the Central Committee be sent and this was flatly refused.
Read more about this topic: Kengir Uprising
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