who reserved this time for Members of Congress to speak out on behalf of Soviet Jewry. On May 5. 1985. 100.000 people are expected to gather near the United Nations for the 14th annual "Solidarity Sunday for Soviet Jewry." To express my solidarity with Soviet Jews. I would like to share with my colleagues some important facts concerning Soviet Jewish emigration. It is now a widely known fact that fewer than 1.000 Soviet Jews were permitted to emigtate in 1984. This was the lowest number in over a decade. and a very sharp contrast to the 51.000 who were allowed to emigrate during 1979. What is a less publicized fact is that Soviet authorities are reacting. at least in part. against the mass exodus of Soviet Jews who emigrated between 1968 and 1981 when Soviet policies were comparatively more liberal. More than a quarter million Jews had left the Soviet Union by the early 1980s. and hundreds of thousands more were applying to emigrate. These developments were an embarrassment to the Soviet leadership who promoted the U.S.S.R. as a peoples paradise.
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emigrate emigration emigrated