A Soviet official said here Thursday that the future of relations between the Soviet Union and Israel is up to Israel. He also indicated that Soviet and Israeli diplomats are in “regular” contact at the United Nations in New York.
Ambassador Vladimir Lomeiko, head of the Soviet delegation to the conference of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, spoke at a press conference in response to questions by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “The key for the resumption of diplomatic relations between the USSR and Israel is in the Israeli hands,” he said.
Lomeiko maintained that the Soviet Union is “implementing widely our policy of letting people who wish to emigrate do so.” He also claimed that many emigrants are returning. “They are thousands,” he said.
Asked if the new policy would allow Jews who immigrated to Israel to return to the USSR to visit their families, and Jews in the Soviet Union to visit their families in Israel, the Soviet diplomat replied: “Unfortunately, we have no diplomatic relations with Israel or any other contact which would enable an easier way of action. All the keys for such relations are in the hands of Israel. There are regular contacts in New York between our diplomats and Israelis.”
SEES LITTLE EVIDENCE OF CHANGE
Ambassador Pinchas Eliav, the Israeli envoy to the UN here, said Thursday that Israel appreciates the statements by the Soviet leadership about new approaches to social and cultural issues and emigration, but so far has seen little concrete evidence of change.
He said while Israel welcomes the release of a number of Jewish Prisoners of Conscience, the overall situation of Soviet Jewry remains worrisome. He spoke of the denial to Jews of all forms of national and cultural expression, the fact that there are no Jewish or Hebrew schools, and even a small private Jewish kindergarten in Moscow was closed by the police.
“We will always remember that it was the valor of the Red Army which was principally responsible for the physical survival of this remnant, but what is at stake now is its spiritual and national existence,” Eliav said.
With respect to emigration, the Israeli envoy said, the new Soviet regulations “are a mere codification of a highly restrictive practice and in fact even represent a deterioration of the legal situation by limiting emigration essentially to those seeking to reunite with very close relatives abroad.
“They fail to insure that the demand of hundreds of thousands of Soviet Jews to be permitted to live in the Jewish State are granted. In fact, in the month of February 1987, only 142 could leave the country, and thus even the assertion that 500 exit permits were granted in January has yet not been substantiated,” Eliav said.
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