A group of British intellectuals representing the arts and sciences sent telegrams today to Soviet Premier Alexsei N. Kosygin and Communist Party chief Leonid Brezhnev expressing “concern and alarm” over the trial in Leningrad and possible future trials of Russian Jews. The signatories included Sir Laurence Olivier, director of the National Theater; Dame Sybil Thorndike; Malcolm Muggeridge; actress Siobhan McKenna; Prof. A. J. Ayer; Prof. Julius Gould and actor Laurence Harvey. (A similar group of French intellectuals urged the Soviet government in a telegram sent today to open the Leningrad trial to foreign observers. Among the signers were Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Clara Malraux and Yves Montand.) The British personalities stated in their message, “Our anxiety is intensified by reports that similar trials are being prepared of Jewish citizens of the Soviet Union who have unsuccessfully applied for permission to go to Israel.” They added that the closed trial in Leningrad “revives memories of the victimizations of 1952.”
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