Twenty-six Nobel Prize winners today protested the trial of Anatoly Shcharansky "in the strongest possible terms." The protest was contained in a telegram sent to the President of the Soviet Academy of Sciences by the Committee of Concerned Scientists. Calling Shcharansky’s prosecution a "flagrant violation of basic principles of scientific and human rights," the Nobelists stated that his trial will "have a deleterious effect on the willingness of Western scientists to engage in scholarly exchanges with the USSR."
Linus Pauling, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in both peace and chemistry as well as the Lenin Peace Prize, was among the signers of the cable. Others signing included: Kenneth J. Arrow, Julius Axelrod, Polykarp Kusch, Simon Kuznets, Isidor I. Rabi, Paul A. Samuelson, and Rosalyn S. Yalow.
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