Jews in the Soviet Union have been considered a “security risk” by the Kremlin since 1950 and measures to eliminate them from important positions as well as to deport them from strategic and key industrial centers have been carried out quietly since that time, it was reported today in Observer, leading London Sunday newspaper, from Munich.
Based on a study of testimony of refugees who escaped from the Iron Curtain countries, the report–collated by Radio Free Europe–says that tens of thousands of surviving Jews in Communist countries “are threatened by a policy of deportation.” It estimates that about 30,000 Jews were deported to the Biro-Bidjan region in 1950-51, including many from former Polish territory, Bessarabia and the Baltic countries. They are not treated as prisoners,but are forbidden to leave the area, the report states.
Inside the Soviet Union, the report reveals, Jews have been eliminated from key positions in the security services. As early as 1950, they were banned from communications training in the navy and in the air force and in the middle of 1952 they were excluded from courses in journalism, radio and the social sciences at universities in Moscow, Minsk, Kharkov and Kiev, the report says.
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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.
