Bearing renewed and emphatic insistence from leaders of both parties in the Congress and the Jewish community for further Soviet relaxation of its emigration policies, Dr. Henry Kissinger leaves tomorrow for Moscow for four-days of discussions with Soviet government leaders. Soviet treatment of Jews that weighs heavily on the Soviet-American trade agreement is prominent on the list of topics along with Soviet Communist Party Secretary General Leonid Brezhnev’s forthcoming visit to the United States, probably in early summer.
In a powerful renewal of Congressional pressure for White House insistence on free emigration for Soviet citizens including Jews, Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D.Wash.) and Representatives Wilbur Mills (D.Ark.) and Charles A. Vanik (D. Ohio) assured the National Conference on Soviet Jewry today that there is no change whatsoever in their feelings about the legislation they have introduced to bring about relief for prospective immigrants.
Mills, in fact, re-enforced his support for the Mills-Vanik Bill which he himself had introduced in the House by personally sponsoring yesterday the addition of three more Representatives to his bill. Rep. Joseph J. Maraziti (R.NJ), James Mann (D.S.C.) and Edward Blester (R.Pa.) joined the list of sponsors bringing their number to 279–close to two-thirds of the 435 members of the House.
Dr. Kissinger himself, late yesterday at a White House meeting with three Jewish leaders, was reported as being sympathetic to Jewish concern that the Soviet procedures for processing applications for emigration was “cruel and arbitrary.” (See separate story.)
LAST MINUTE APPEAL
In a last minute appeal to Dr. Kissinger, Republican Senate Leader Hugh Scott pointed out to President Nixon’s national security advisor today that “all that could be done has not been done either on our side or theirs.” This was in reference to the activities by both the Nixon Administration and the Soviet leadership on the emigration issue.
Expressing himself as “not entirely satisfied” with the Soviet relaxation thus far of the education tax, Scott sent a personal letter by special messenger to Dr. Kissinger to disclose his views in writing.
In his letter, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency was told, Scott warned Dr. Kissinger that “the Jackson Amendment still commands majority support in the Senate and I suspect in the House as well in spite of the well publicized lifting of the visa fax.” Continuing, Scott stated: “The only way to defuse it in the Congress is to obviate the need for it, and I believe this can and should be done, I hope you will make a special effort to raise this issue.”
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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.
