The State Department said that the United States deplores the arrest by Soviet authorities of Dr. Victor Brailovsky, a leading Soviet Jewish activist, in Moscow last Thursday.
The 45-year-old cyberneticist, editor of the Jewish Samizdat journal, “Jews in the USSR, “was arrested Nov. 13 as some 100 refusniks gathered at the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet to deliver a letter to President Leonid Brezhnev accusing the Soviet Union of violating the Helsinki Accords by refusing to grant emigration visas. The demonstration was scheduled to coincide with the opening of the conference reviewing the Helsinki accords in Madrid.
“We deplore this action,” a State Department spokesman told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency after the confirmed that Brailovsky had been charged with “spreading fabrications defaming” the state. The spokesman said the Department will continue to follow developments in Brailovsky’s case.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.