September 28. President Reagan will conduct his first meeting with a topranking Soviet official since he took office in 1981. Sadly. over the past several years we have seen a steady erosion in the number of Jews allowed to emigrate from the Soviet Union. As the breach between the United States and the U.S.S.R. has widened. the decline in the number of immigrants continued in a devastating. downward spiral. In all candor. the situation today is quite dismal. President Reagans meeting with Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko provides a unique opportunity to raise some very important issues that have received woefully inadequate attention over the past several years. I think we must acknowledge that the deterioration in United StatesSoviet relations has had a chilling effect on the rate of emigration. It will take a significant improvement in the dialog between our countries before we will see some real progress in the sphere of arms control and human rights. two issues in which I have a particular concern. An examination of the emigration statistics provides a stark and disturbing picture. At the height of detente between the United States and the Soviet Union. more Soviet Jews were permitted to leave than at any other time in history. In 1979. 51.320 people received permission to emigrate from the Soviet Union. This number has tragically fallen off in each subsequent year. So far this year. only 650 people have left. and the repression of the Jewish community has intensified. Although many voices have been raised regarding the dismal human rights conditions in the Soviet Union. these calls have been met with silence by the Soviet authorities. who have been unwilling to permit the Jews to fulfill their basic right to emigrate. Instead. we have seen this government lash out with its brutal power to silence and intimidate the Jewish community. As we all know. an individual who makes the decision to leave becomes the subject of intensified harassment and discrimination.
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