Soviet torture

Press, 13 September 1983, Page 16

Soviet torture

Sir,—Contrary to what J. Sharp believes (September 10) no “indisputable facts emerge from outside sources” on the South Korean airliner incident. Two facts are indisputable. The airliner was 500 km inside Soviet territory, overflying a highly sensitive militarilyfortified area, and was there for oVer two hours. It can be assumed that in those two hours it was repeatedly challenged and signalled to land, which it refused to do. Hardly the behaviour of a civilian airliner that has accidentally and innocently wandered off course. J. Sharp is either naive or indulging a misguided sense of humour in claiming that the Pentagon is under the control of the American Govern-

ment when President Reagan is as unbridled a war hawk as his generals. On Saturday’s cable page is evidence, in the meeting between Shultz and Gromyko in Madrid, that the Reagan Administration is exploiting the airliner incident to evade serious talks on nuclear disarmament. — Yours, etc.,

M. CREEL. September 10, 1983.

Sir,—Amnesty International knows of nearly 200 Soviet citizens forcibly, confined to psychiaitric hospitals for political rather than authentic medical reasons over the last eight years. Among recent cases are Yury Ternopolsky, an architect who arranged an unauthorised meeting with a Swedish journalist; Dr Algirdas Statkericius, a Lithuanian psychiatrist, who joined an unofficial human rights group; and Pastor Velio Salum, who preached on the national traditions of the Estonian Church. Those confined are deprived of virtually any protection against illtreatment, and there is factual information, citing name and place, of the use of massive doses of drugs. Soviet citizens, including psychiatrists, who have tried to expose the abuse, have themselves been imprisoned, confined or exiled. M. Creel (September 8) asks for evidence. These cases are not denied. They arise from defining expressions of political dissent as a form of schizophrenia unique to the U.S.S.R. — Yours, etc.,

J. E. MURRAY. September 9, 1983.

Sir,—ln reply to M. Creel’s letter asking for evidence of the abuse of psychiatry against political dissenters in the Soviet Union, I would ask him to read News and Notes of the British Journal of

Psychiatry, September 1976, December 1976, November 1978, February 1979, May 1980. These include Interviews with Mr Leonid Plyushch, documentation of the Soviet Union’s refusal to allow an international investigation commission, a statement by Dr Alexander Voloshanovich and a letter to Dr Gluzman, then detained in a prison camp. The latter two are Russian medical practitioners, and have been persecuted because of their stand against the abuse of psychiatry. They speak with knowledge and personal experience. Either you accept such evidence or you subscribe to the theory of an elaborate conspiracy. I prefer the former explanation. — Yours, etc.,

JOHN R. M. ROGERS. September 9, 1983.