Speech #990081268

I had the opportunity to meet with a prominent Jewish refusenik. Prof. Naum Meiman. and his wife. Inna. My acquaintance with Professor Meiman and his wife has given these grim statistics from the Soviet Union a human face. one I shall never forget. The Meimans applied for an emigration visa in 1975. the year that the Final Act of the Helsinki accords was ratified. The Soviet Governments first response was to dismiss Professor Melman from his position at the Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics in Moscow. In the heady atmosphere following the ratification of the Final Act by the Soviet Government.