The trial in Kishinev of nine Jews linked by the Russian authorities to the alleged June, 1970, skyjacking attempt will begin June 21, reliable Jewish sources disclosed here today. The trial was supposed to have started May 26, but was postponed without explanation. The Jewish sources also reported that the nine Jews convicted in the second Leningrad trial last month appealed their sentences May 27, with their attorneys moving to quash the treason charges against them. Meanwhile, 35-year-old Russian Jewish librarian Roiza Palatnik, who was arrested for anti-Soviet activities last December and subsequently went on a hunger strike to obtain a Yiddish interrogator, will go on trial around the middle of this month, the sources said.
The Jewish informants also reported that eight Kiev Jews tried to submit an anti-trial article to the Soviet newspapers Pravda and Izvestia. They were identified as Israel Kleiner, Edvard Davidovich, Anatoly Feldman, Israel Slobodsky, Boris Krasniy, Igor Rais, Mark Barboi and a person with the surname Oretskiy. Kleiner was said to have been told by the KGB (secret police) that his act had cost him his recently approved exit visa. Meanwhile, it was reported, the Sverdlovsk authorities ended on May 23 their interrogation of Valeri Kukui, a Jew accused of anti-Soviet slander. Jewish sources say he and his friends publicized anti-trial petitions.
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