SCIENCE
Soviet Repression of Refusenik Scientists Unabated The arrest of chemist Yuri Tarnopolsky points up the continuing plight of refusenik scientists in the Soviet Union under its new leadership When Yuri Andropov was elevated to Soviet leader last November, hopes were expressed by some western observers that he would turn over a new leaf in Soviet scientific relations with the West. Some U.S. scientists suggested, for example, that easing the plight of prominent imprisoned or internally exiled Soviet dissident scientists—such as Andrei Sakharov, Yuri Orlov, Anatoly Scharansky, and Victor Brailovsky—would help. It surely would move U.S. scientific organizations and individual scientists, and perhaps federal scientific agencies, to restore at least part of the relations with Soviet scientists that the U.S. side cut in early 1980 in response to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the arrest of Sakharov, and other actions against dissident scientists. A Soviet gesture of this kind may yet come. Indeed, there were hints last month that the Soviets might permit Sakharov to emigrate to the West. But so far, by all accounts, Andropov's rule has brought only an intensified crackdown against dissident scientists. One of the most recent targets is a 47-year-old chemist, Yuri Tarnopolsky, from the Ukrainian city of Kharkov, about 400 miles southwest of Moscow. Arrested on March 15 and jailed since, Tarnopolsky probably will be put on trial within the next few weeks, according to the
Committee of Concerned Scientists (CCS). The charges against him most likely will be "defaming the Soviet state/' Under the U.S.S.R. criminal code, this carries a maximum sentence of three years' internal exile. Tarnopolsky's arrest climaxes his seven-year struggle to obtain permission to emigrate to Israel with his wife and 12-year-old daughter. A professor of organic chemistry for 12 years at the Polytechnical Institute in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk and author of more then 60 scientific papers, he first applied to emigrate in 1976. Almost three years passed before he received an answer, which was refusal. Like most other "refuseniks," Tarnopolsky was dismissed from his workplace after applying to emigrate. Returning to Kharkov, where he had graduated from the Polytechnical Institute, he soon became a leader in refusenik activities. For example, with three other refusenik
Tarnopolsky as he appeared at end of 40-day hunger strike last November . „
.
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Some Soviet chemists, chemical engineers denied emigration since early 1970s First refusal 3
Maya Aleinikova (Moscow) Valéry Byrhovsky (Moscow) Abram Englin (Moscow) Viktor Faermark (Moscow) Lev Faiman (Moscow) Musia Flaks (Donetsk) Solomon Flaks (Donetsk) Leonid Galperin (Leningrad) Olga Gershun (Leningrad) Mikhail Gleizer (Kaliningrad) losif Golfman (Leningrad) Ada Grauer (Chernovtsy) Semion Livshits (Leningrad) Emmanuel Lurie (Moscow) Mark Lvovsky (Moscow)
1978 1980 1974 1971 1979 1978 1978 1978 1980 1979 1978 1972 1980 1980 1973
First refusal 3
Emil Mendzheritzky (Moscow) Lev Ozersky (Leningrad) Leonid Shabashev (Moscow) Yadkov Shverdinovsky (Brest) Yakov Sirota (Kharkov) Gita Stolyar (Moscow) Yuri Tarnopolsky (Kharkov) llya Tiomkin (Leningrad) Dora Tsukerman (Belisy) Anatoly Volovich (Moscow) Leonid Yuzefovich (Moscow) Mikhail Yusim (Leningrad) Lilya Zatuchnaya (Kharkov) Stanislav Zubko (Kiev)
|
1979 1977 1979 1980
| |
1978
J
1975 1979 1978 1978 1981 1981 1979 1979 1980
! :
! | | 'I
a In many cases, date of original application to emigrate was one to three years prior to date of first refusal of permission. Note: This list is preliminary; additional names of Soviet chemist and chemical engineer "refuseniks" are being collected. Source: Committee of Concerned Scientists
May 16, 1983C&EN
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Science
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scientists—physicists Alexander Paritsky and Evgeny Chudnovsky and cyberneticist David Soloveichik—he founded an unofficial university that met at its teachers' apartments in 1980-81 and taught science and Jewish culture to refusenik children who were denied entry to official Soviet universities. However, in August 1981, police raided the Tarnopolsky, Soloveichik, and Chudnovsky apartments—confiscating books and papers—and arrested Paritsky, putting an end to the university. Paritsky is serving a three-year term in a labor camp. In October and November 1982, after repeated denials of an exit visa, Tarnopolsky sought to convince the authorities to let him emigrate by going on a 40-day hunger strike. The authorities, however, were not moved. CCS's executive director, Dorothy Hirsch, points out that Tarnopolsky is far from being the only chemist who has been struggling and suffering for years in an attempt to leave the U.S.S.R. A preliminary list gathered by CCS includes 29 refusenik chemists and chemical engineers— some of them senior researchers— and more names are being collected. Hirsch notes that the trial of Tarnopolsky for "defaming the Soviet state"—the same charges used against refusenik scientists Paritsky and Brailovsky, for example—appears to be part of the Soviet pattern of crushing dissent everywhere. Indeed, since Tarnopolsky's arrest, the Soviets have acted against other Kharkov refusenik scientists, including searching Chudnovsky's apartment and questioning Soloveichik. Currently, there are an estimated 5000 refuseniks, some 500 of them scientists. However, 400,000 Soviet Jews are believed to have obtained letters of invitation from people in Israel—the required step before applying to emigrate. Soviet authorities have permitted some 260,000 Jews to emigrate since the early 1970s. However, since the peak year 1979, when 51,320 were allowed to leave, the Soviets have drastically cut back emigration—to 21,471 in 1980,9447 in 1981, and only 2688 last year. This year the pace has
slowed even more, with just 305 emigrating through March. Soviet officials cite several reasons for denying emigration visas. In theory, emigration is to effect "reunion of families" in Israel. In recent years the authorities have tightened up and made "insufficient degree of relationship" a major reason for refusal—as in the Tarnopolsky case, for instance. Other reasons cited include "possession of security clearance" (even for work done a decade or two ago and that western scientists would not consider security-related to begin with), military service, possession of an advanced degree, or a vague "it's not expedient at this time," or "the bad state of international relations now." Indeed, U.S. observers consider poor relations with the U.S. to be the major cause for the decline in emigration. In the meantime, Tarnopolsky has started a hunger strike in his jail cell to protest his arrest. CCS is encouraging U.S. scientists to express their concern, before the trial, in letters to Soviet officials, U.S. political leaders, and U.S. general and scientific media. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences is quietly taking up the case. And the American Chemical Society's Committee on International Activities has recommended sending a letter of concern to the Soviets. That letter is awaiting approval by the ACS Board. Richard Seltzer, Washington
Tables of chemical properties published Publication of the "National Bureau of Standards Tables of Chemical Thermodynamic Properties: Selections for Inorganic and d and C2 Organic Substances in SI Units" caps a 20-year effort that the participants describe as monumental. The volume is a modern version of NBS Circular 500 (published in 1952) and supersedes the eight parts of the NBS Technical Note 270 series that appeared between 1965 and 1981. The volume is being published as Supplement 2 to Volume 11 of the Journal of Physical & Chemical Reference Data, a joint publication of the American Chemical Society, the
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