Crowd of Thousands in Central Square Demands "Change"

UNCLAS ULAANBAATAR 000588 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV SOCI PHUM MG SUBJECT: Crowd of Thousands in Central Square Demands "Change" ¶1. Over the past few months, Ulaanbaatar's central Sukhbaatar Square has been home to dozens of demonstrations for a variety of causes. The target of the protesters, Government House, is conveniently located just north of the Square. Demonstrators have demanded the resignation of the government and the investigation of the President and Prime Minister for corruption; insisted the government sharply increase pensions and child stipends; demanded that Mongolians, not foreigners, profit from the country's mineral wealth; and implored the government to compensate savings and loan depositors harmed by the collapse of bankrupt institutions. In the last few days, angry couples demonstrated against Speaker Nyamdorj's decision that will prevent them from collecting a new MNT 500,000 (US $425 -- a tidy sum in Mongolia) marriage payment. ¶2. However, while these issues matter deeply to many Mongolians, the demonstrators for each respective cause numbered at most several hundred. By contrast, on the evening of July 31, Sukhbaatar Square was filled to capacity with excited Mongolian youth. Just after midnight, the crowd began to shout for "change" -- "the Winds of Change" that is. Klause Meine, the lead singer of the Scorpions, soon complied in the encore to the band's 90-minute set. From the statue of General Sukhbaatar (the hero of the 1921 independence revolution) to Government House to the stock exchange, the lyrics began to echo: "I follow the Moskva Down to Gorky Park Listening to the wind of change An August summer night Soldiers passing by Listening to the winds of change The world is closing in Did you ever think That we could be so close, like brothers The future's in the air I can feel it everywhere Blowing with the winds of change" ¶3. "Winds of Change" by Germany's Scorpions is the iconic song of the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall. On August 1, as part of Mongolia's 800th anniversary celebrations, it rang through the site of Mongolia's democratic revolution. The demonstrations in Sukhbaatar Square began on December 10, 1989 (International Human Rights Day); three months later, large crowds cheered the resignation of the world's second oldest Communist government. The Scorpions concert was one of the largest (and certainly the loudest) gatherings in the Square since then. The majority of Mongolians in the crowd would have been in kindergarten at most in 1989; the now 50-ish generation of hunger strikers that brought down the government in 1990 (several current Democratic Party MPs among them) are regarded by some as "old fogies" who, for the good of Mongolia's democratic future, have to give way to a younger generation less prone to bickering and personality-based factionalism. We suspect few in the crowd for the concert had politics on their mind -- certainly not the 100 teenagers in Metallica T-shirts who formed a large circle in the middle of the crowd. ¶4. Mongolians are well-noted for not adhering to schedules, and the Scorpions concert was no different. The concert was scheduled to begin at 8:00 PM, but assembly of the camera platforms was just beginning then, and it would be over two hours before sound checks were held. The road crew for the Scorpions groaned to a questioner about the tremendous foul-ups that had them scrambling to get things ready. At 8:00 PM, the clang of assembly at the concert site was matched on the north side by the construction noise of the new Genghis Khan memorial hall; the memorial hall was supposed to be finished by national day three weeks ago, but will be lucky to have the exterior enclosed before the snow falls in September. ¶5. In his introduction for the band, the German charge noted that the concert would not have been possible without the efforts of Minister for Industry and Trade Jargalsaikhan. Jargalsaikhan, the sole MP for his party, is a sometime impresario among his business enterprises. In February, shortly after coming in as minister in the new coalition government, Jargalsaikhan spent much of the British ambassador's first call on him urging that the Rolling Stones come to Mongolia as part of the 800th anniversary events. We gather he was more successful with the Germans -- and perhaps chipped in to cover the expenses. In the front of the audience in Sukhbaatar Square, appreciative German tourists waved their country's flag and joined in the shouts for "change." And so did the U.S. Embassy staff -- one of whom had dug out his 1984 Scorpions world tour T-shirt -- scattered among the crowd. Soon enough, Klaus Meine's distinctive voice sounded through the Square: "The wind of change blows straight Into the face of time Like a stormwind that will ring The freedom bell for peace of mind" SLUTZ