the Far East, was greeted with cheers by the gathering when a message from him was read.
Anton Tadgeier, secretary of the national minority section of the Central Soviet government, was among the first speakers at the opening session.
Pointing out that founding of the Jewish autonomous region was not an accident, but part of the Soviet policy on national minorities, the speaker listed the national minority republics created in Central Asia during the last ten years.
Since the Jews were among the most oppressed of minorities under Czarism, M. Tadgeier declared, the Soviet government has from the beginning devoted itself to questions of agricultural construction among the Jewish masses.
He pointed to the fact that special land reserves in Crimea, Ukraine and White Russia have been settled with 75,000 Jewish collective farmers, while tens of thousands of Jewish youth are engaged in various industrial projects there.
POSITION MADE BETTER
“The position of the Jewish small town workers,” he said, “has been vastly improved. The social appearance of the Jewish nationality in the Soviet countries has been radically changed.
“The intention of the Soviet government in allocating Biro-Bidjan as a Jewish autonomous region is to concentrate compact Jewish masses over a large area.”
M. Tadgeier, in the course of his address, stressed the fact that the Bureya region is rich in natural resources.
Other speakers expressed the government’s hope that the Jews will convert the region into one of the most flourishing sections in the Far East.
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.
