Four months of interrogations against leading refusnik Dr. Naum Salansky ended dramatically today as the Vilna Prosecutor signed a document dropping charges of “anti-Soviet slander” against the 40-year-old physicist, according to the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry and Union of Councils for Soviet Jews. The information was received in a phone call by the Detroit Committee for Soviet Jewry. The prosecutor told Salansky that he would “soon” be able to rejoin his mother in Israel, who is dying of face cancer.
According to the three groups, “Salansky was a cause celebre among Soviet Jewish refusniks. He was caught in a nightmarish web of accusations that he ‘slandered the USSR for its treatment of Jews,’ based on letters, many of which he never wrote, and others which were only personal or part of his application for an exit visa. The dropping of the charges again vindicates the power of public opinion and represents a victory for the many legislators, scientists and people of goodwill who fought for his release.”
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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.
