Ukrainian human-rights groups appeal to United Nations (12/30/84)

Ukrainian human-rights groups appeal to United Nations

JERSEY CITY, N.J. - Three Ukrainian human-rights organizations recently co-signed joint letters to United Nations Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar, all U.N. missions in New York and to members of Congress calling for an international investigation into the recent deaths of Soviet political prisoners.

The letters were signed by Ihor Olshaniwsky of the New Jersey-based Americans for Human Rights in Ukraine, Dr. Andrew Zwarun, president of the Smoloskyp Organization for Defense of Human Rights in Ukraine, and former dissidents Nadia Svitlychna and Nina Strokata-Karavansky, both members of the External Representation of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group.

In their letter to senators, congressmen and to the U.N. missions, the groups charged that the Soviet government had "decided to solve its dissident problem through the physical destruction of dissidents," a solution they charged was directed "foremost against the Ukrainian human- and national-rights activists."

As evidence, the groups cited the recent deaths of three imprisoned Ukrainian dissidents: Oleksiy Tykhy, who died in a labor camp following surgery last May; Yuriy Lytvyn, who reportedly committed suicide at age 50 in September; and Valeriy Marchenko, who died in October of kidney disease exacerbated by a harsh labor-camp regimen.

The letter also mentions the death last spring of independent trade union movement activist Alexei Nikitin, who died at age 47, shortly after being released from a psychiatric hospital after serving a lengthy term.

"We ask you to insist that the governments of the USSR and the Ukrainian SSR guarantee the safety and adequate medical care for their political prisoners and allow the International Red Cross Committee to visit these prisoners to determine their physical and mental condition," the letter said.

The letter to Mr. Perez de Cuellar, which was attached to the other letters, also cited the four dead activists and listed six other Ukrainians, rights activists and cultural figures whose deaths it attributed to the Soviets, among them artist Alla Horska, composer Volodymyr Ivasiuk and Volodymyr Osadchy.

Also listed were two dissidents who the letter said were crippled after being denied proper medical treatment while imprisoned: Yuriy Shukhevych, who is totally blind alter over 30 years in Soviet custody, and Ivan Svitlvchny, a literary critic who is paralyzed after several strokes suffered while imprisoned.

The groups also warned that political prisoners Anatoly Koryagin, a dissident psychiatrist; Vasyl Stus, a Ukrainian poet; as well as Ukrainians Zorian Popadiuk, Yuriy Badzio and Mykola Rudenko find themselves in "especially threatening" medical straits.

"Only your personal interest and the intervention of the august international body you head can stop the terror being visited upon Ukrainian human-rights activists and political prisoners in the USSR," the letter said.

It asked the secretary general to demand that the Soviets make a full disclosure about the deaths of Ukrainian activists and that the issue be discussed at the next meeting of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights. The three groups also wanted the Soviet government to "guarantee the safety and health" of political prisoners, and asked that the International Red Cross investigate medical conditions.