Leonid Brezhnev’s presentation of the Soviet emigration issue to the 21 Senators and two Representatives who were his luncheon guests at Blair House yesterday is more important for what it concealed than for what it actually revealed. The lawmakers said the Communist Party Secretary dealt with the subject seriously and candidly, but they reserved judgement on the statistics he offered on Jewish emigration from the USSR, the number of exit visas requested and the number granted.
As Sen. Hubert H. Humphrey (D.Minn.) put it after emerging from Blair House, “Both the figures and interpretation are theirs.” Sen. J. William Fulbright (D.Ark.) who is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and an ardent advocate of an end to the Cold War, was skeptical. Asked by a reporter if he believed Brezhnev’s figures, Fulbright replied, “How can I judge? It is difficult for me to believe even our own budget.”
Fulbright said, however, that the U.S.-Soviet trade bill should not be held up for every individual report of harsh treatment for a Soviet Jew.
The figures Brezhnev gave the American lawmakers are open to question–even such basic figures as the total Jewish population of the USSR which the Soviet leader put at 2,151,000. American specialists on the Soviet Union said the figure was about one-third short of the total of more than 3 million Jews in Russia.
EXPERTS NOTE DISCREPANCIES
They based their higher estimate on previous statistics and on the apparent rate of assimilation of Jews into the Russian and Ukrainian nationalities.
The analysts noted that a similar discrepancy was evident in the 1970 census which gave the number of Jews who declared Yiddish their first language as about 393,000. They said this figure was too low and opined that Soviet bureaucrats had lopped off several hundred thousand from the overall Yiddish statistics to suit their internal policies.
Brezhnev told the Senators yesterday that 61,000 Jews had applied for exit visas, apparently since 1970 and that of these 60,200 had been granted. The latter figure tallies with the number of emigrants who have arrived in Israel. But the Soviet figure for applications is less than two-fifths of the number of affidavits Soviet Jews have requested from the Israeli government for immigration purposes. Since the 1967 Six-Day War more than 160,000 Jews have requested affidavits.
According to Soviet Jewry activists here, the Israel government certifies the mailing of documents to every applicant. Thus both the Israeli and Soviet governments know who receives them. But only the Soviet bureaucracy knows how many have actually applied for visas. The bureaucrats can easily say there were 61,000 applicants even if more than double that number had actually applied. The Israeli figures can be verified but not those of the Soviet bureaucracy.
According to Brezhnev’s account, 1300 of the 11,400 visa applicants this year decided to withdraw their visa requests. Why they did was not discussed at Blair House, probably out of courtesy to the hosts. But activists here say that dismissals from jobs, denunciation by neighbors, harassment by police and drafting into the army are some of the consequences of applying for a visa. Numerous other devices, including confinement to mental hospitals have been used to discourage Jews from applying, the activists said.
Brezhnev said that 738 applicants were denied visas this year. By referring to this, Brezhnev clearly implied that the Soviet bureaucracy decides who can and cannot emigrate. This, of course, is contrary to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to which the Soviet Union subscribes which says that all individuals, without exception or qualification, have the right to leave their country.
This is the crux of the emigration issue and the essence of the Jackson Amendment. It has not been solved by the Brezhnev account.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
