Mr. President. virtually every day we are confronted with chilling new evidence of the continuing human tragedy of people who can neither tolerate nor be tolerated by the Soviet Government but are denied their fundamental human right to emigrate to a nation which would welcome them. Seven Soviet Jewish scientists are now in the fifth day of a hunger strike in Moscow undertaken in desperate protest against "the principle of human beings as property. as manifested in our forcible detainment in the U.S.S.R." One of these scientists. Prof. Mark Azbel. has been in telephone contact with Prof. Edward Stern of the University of Washington. in connection with an invitation extended by the universitys department of physics to spend part or all of the 197374 academic year as visiting faculty. Professor Azbel was head of the department of electron theory of metals at the Landau Institute of Theoretical Physics in Moscow until he was forced to resign his post and forfeit his salary as a consequence of requesting permission to emigrate to Israel last fall. His book on "The Electron Theory of Metals" is now being withdrawn from Soviet lbraries and his writings have been banned from Soviet scientific journals. With the Soviet authorities effectively depriving Dr. Azbel of his professional existence in the Soviet Union or anywhere else. the threat is now to his human existence. Dr. Azbels 12yearold son was given permission to emigrate on March 27 and is now safely in Israel. On May 21. Dr. Azbel and his wife were notified that their own visa applications had been rejected. Mr. President. in telephone conversations on June 8 and June 11.
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emigrate visa