Anatoly Shcharansky, who was recently moved from Chistipol Prison to the Perm labor camp some 600 miles from Moscow, was finally granted permission to be visited by his mother and brother, the first time since August 1979 and only the third time since his arrest in March 1977, it was reported by the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry (SSSJ) and the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews (UCSJ). The visit, however, was cut from three days to one as punishment for Shcharansky’s “violation of rules” in Chistipol Prison.
Ida Milgrom, his mother, and Leonid Shcharansky, his brother, reported after returning home to Moscow that Anatoly is working as an apprentice lathe operator, eight hours a day, six days a week at a camp machine shop. He is living in a barracks with other prisoners, some of whom are “politicals” as he is, and others who were Nazi collaborators.
Mrs. Milgrom said her son told her that the grim labor camp, where hunger is pervasive, was still “freedom” in comparison with the notorious Chistipol Prison where he could not even see the daylight. She said he spends his spare time walking in the camp compound. Mrs. Milgrom said Anatoly told her “I haven’t yet time to become a member of the ‘labor collective’ but for the first time in three years I now sleep in a bed with two bedsheets and am in a room with natural daylight.” When he was transferred from Chistipol he was forced to leave behind almost all his belongings, including his books, Mrs. Milgrom said.
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