After numerous protests, Kiev activist Vladimir Kislak has been released from a psychiatric hospital where he has been held since mid-July, it was reported here today by the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry. The SSSJ said that the Chicago Action for Soviet Jewry learned of Kislak’s release today in telephone calls to both the hospital and to Kislak’s father. The 45-year-old metallurgist, who has been refused an exit visa to Israel since 1973, has been a forget of particularly vicious KGB harassment, according to the Chicago group.
Meanwhile, the SSSJ and the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews reported that Jewish emigration from the USSR “took an Olympic leap downwards” in July, plummeting to a year’s low of 1205. This was more than 30 percent below June’s exit rate and only 28 percent of the 1979 monthly average. Some 900, or 75 percent of the July exitees did not go on to Israel.
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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.