One can live a comfortable life only if he or she refrains from political conversations. comments. and actions. All are safe if they submit to Big Brotherthe Communist Party. A group of dedicated people in the Soviet Union have had the courage. conviction. and dedication to speak out. to say. "No!" I want to be what I am. to say what I want to say. to practice my religion. and to emigrate to the country of my choice. These are the cries of the thousands of Soviet Jews who are either imprisoned on trumped up charges or are restricted to their homes and communities only because of their burning desire to emigrate to freedom. The limited number of Soviet engineers in the 1980s has been alarming to say the least. The number of Soviet Jews that have been allowed to leave the Soviet Union has dropped from a high of 51.320 in 1979 to an everdecreasing 1.314 in 1983. The emigration figures for 1984 discloses only 178 exit visas have been granted to Soviet Jews. 88 in January and only 90 in February. The plight of Soviet Jewry has been heightened by the incarceration of prisoner of conscience Anatoly Shcharansky. Today marks the seventh anniversary of Shcharanskys arrest.
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emigrate emigration visas