About 50 members of the Women’s Campaign for Soviet Jewry demonstrated last night outside the hotel where the Bolshoi Ballet troupe is staying. Apparently not satisfied that exit visas are being issued to Valery and Galina Panov, they chanted “The Panovs are Just two people. Thousands more are being persecuted.” The demonstrators were held back by police but no arrests were made. They said they would shift their demonstrations to the London Coliseum where the Bolshoi opens Wednesday in order to “make the audience feel as guilty as possible.”
There is an ongoing campaign here against the current Bolshoi tour of Britain, stemming from the Panovs’ case but extended to other Russian Jews thwarted in their efforts to obtain exit permits. A petition with thousands of signatures demanding a ban on the Bolshoi was brought to the Coliseum today by actress Diana Rigg. A spokesman for another group that calls itself the “Stop the Bolshoi Committee” said: “We have gone to great lengths to infiltrate performances and have two hundred pounds worth of tickets for the first night. We will do everything we can to bring the ballet to a halt. Our disruptive action will continue whatever the cost during the six-day tour of Britain. They will wish they had never set. foot in Britain by the time we have done with them.”
Meanwhile, it was learned from Jewish sources in the Soviet Union that the Panovs will pick up their exit visas Wednesday and leave the Soviet Union on Friday.
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