Rather than responding favorably to this genuine citizens initiative. however. the Soviet authorities responded with their usual paranoia: Today. 50 of the original 76 Helsinki monitors are serving a total of over 440 years in imprisonment. But the Helsinki Idea had already germinated in the minds of people throughout that last vast empire. the Soviet Union. Other citizens groups were organized: the Christian Committee to Defend the Rights of Believers. the Catholic Committee. and the Adventist Rights Groups Joined together with Pentecostal Emigration Councils and Baptist ministers. printers. and prisoners rights groups. other citizens banded together to espouse the rights of invalids. the victims of psychiatric abuse. and the denial of the rights of Soviet workers. writers and painters groups formed which tried to operate outside the constraints of official censorship. samizdat publications. ranging from unorthodox explorations of hidden facets of Soviet history to fervent espousals of Russian Orthodoxy. also flourished. One may ask why I choose to focus on these citizens initiatives in the Soviet Union when much larger groups. such as Solidarity in Poland. have been suppressed. or when other groups. such as the Freedom Fighters in Afghanistan. continue to fight and die? To such comments I would say that I am focusing today on relatively small groups of people who have responded to what makes the Final Act a powerful moral force In internation. al affairs: the importance of individual initiative.
Keywords matched
Emigration