VAST CONCENTRATION CAMP

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26349, 2 January 1947, Page 5

VAST CONCENTRATION CAMP

Soviet Commercial Attache Refuses to Return Home (Rec. 0.30 a.m.) NEW YORK, Dec. 30. Mr Kiril M. Alexeev, who described himself as an acting commercial attache at the Soviet Embassy in Mexico for two years, declared in a statement issued on his behalf that he considered it his duty “ to announce publicly that I am opposed to the Soviet regime.” The statement was issued by Alexeiev’s New York lawyer, who said that Alexeiev had reason to believe he was sought by Russian officials in the United States. Alexeiev’s statement continued: “ Life abroad has opened to me the true meaning of what I saw in Russia. I cannot return to Russia and doom my family, which has become accustomed to breathe fresh air from freedom and prefers it to life under the heel of dictatorship. The Russian domestic policy is based on the principle of complete isolation of the Russians from the democratic nations, and the Government persistently tries to inoculate the people with a spirit of animosity toward everything foreign. “The entire Soviet is a concentration camp where the fate of everyone depends on the perfidious K.V.D. (secret police),” he continued. “ Even the men closest to the dictator do not feel safe. No nation is more enslaved. Millions of men and women in concentration camps, and whole families have disappeared. The great majority of the Russian people and of the Communists hate the Soviet regime.” Alexeiev, who is aged 37, is a graduate of Moscow Mining Academy. He was sent to Mexico in April, 1944. V A Mexico City Soviet Embassy spokesman expressed surprise that Alexeiev was not already back in Russia. Alexeiev had left Mexico City at the end of November to return home via the United States. , < /