Despite recent claims of adequate matzoh baking facilities this year in Moscow and Leningrad, informed sources here reported today that generally, there is still no organized matzoh baking in those cities and each indivual must bring his own flour.
The sources noted that baking has so far been permitted only at three ovens in three synagogues in the Moscow area and one in Leningrad. They contradicted a claim by Soviet Ambassador to Israel, Dimitri Chuvakhin, that matzoh baking was permitted in Kiev and said that no permit had been granted to the Kiev synagogue which has one oven. The sources also said that a permit had not been granted to the Riga synagogue.
They noted that while the Soviet authorities had recently shown foreign correspondents the ovens in Moscow where matzoh baking was being carried out, no such facilities had been shown to correspondents in Kiev. They voiced the hope that the matzoh ban would be rescinded throughout the Soviet Union.
Meanwhile, the Board of Deputies of British Jews today decided to convene a conference of various Jewish organizations to discuss the position of Soviet Jewry. The meeting will be held on April 8.
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