Mitterrand speaks up for dissident

Press, 23 June 1984, Page 11

Mitterrand speaks up for dissident

NZPA-Reuter Moscow

The French President, Mr Francois Mitterrand, cast aside diplomatic convention yesterday and publicly raised the case of the exiled scientist, Andrei Sakharov, at a State dinner in the Kremlin.

Mr Mitterrand, breaking all precedents for frankness set by other Western leaders on visits to the Soviet Union, spoke after a warning from the Soviet President, Mr Konstantin Chernenko, not to try to advise the Kremlin on human rights. Mr Mitterrand, improvising his speech from notes, appealed to Mr Chernenko and the assembled Communist Party Politburo to understand Western emotion over violations of the human rights provision in the 1975 Helsinki agreements.

“This is why we sometimes speak of the cases of people who are symbolic,” Mr Mitterrand said.

“This is how one should understand the emotion which exists in Europe and in many other places over cases which concern citizens of your country — similar cases exist elsewhere — such as the case of Professor Sakharov, or of unknown

persons in all countries of the world who cite the Helsinki accords.” Dr Sakharov was reported by friends to have begun a hunger strike on May 2 to demand permission for his wife, Yelena Bonner, to go to the West for medical treatment.

Uncertainty over the condition of the couple seemed to threaten Mr Mitterrand's trip to Moscow. Dr Sakharov’s stepdaughter, Tatyana Yankelevich, now living in the West, urged him last week to seek assurances on their health. The Soviet authorites have said that the couple is well and eating regularly.

Mr Mitterrand went on to criticise Soviet activity in Afghanistan and made a clear, if indirect, attack on the banning of the free trade union, Solidarity, in Poland.

Mr Chernenko, in a rejoinder to the position taken by Mr Mitterrand at their talks earlier yesterday, told him in his speech not to try to advise the Kremlin on human rights. “We will not permit anyone to interfere in our affairs,” Mr Chernenko told the Kremlin banquet. He made no reference to Dr Sahkarov, but said that the communist system gave

people real guarantees of human rights, such as the rights to work, education, and health.

"So those who try to give us advice on the subject of human rights provoke only an ironic smile,” Mr Chernenko said.

He also reproached Mr Mitterrand for supporting the deployment of American medium-range nuclear missiles in Europe, which he said had diminished the security of all. While France has not been part of the missile deployment, Mr Mitterrand has given it strong backing as the only way to restore the balance of forces in Europe to compensate for Soviet deployment of SS2O missiles.

Mr Chernenko said that Moscow would not return to the negotiating table with the United States on the issue of medium-range nuclear weapons unless the West took “practical, tangible steps,” to make such talks possible.

Mr Chernenko acknowledged that there were differences between Paris and Moscow on key international problems — a reference to other issues such as Afghanistan and Poland.