The Release of Grigorenko
In January 1974, after a routine examination, a commission of doctors at Moscow Regional Psychiatric Hospital No. 5 (Stolbovaya Station) again failed to recommend the cessation of compulsory treatment for P. G. Grigorenko [1].
The doctors let slip by accident that the reason for this decision was that there was no guarantee that P. G. Grigorenko would not return to his former activities. In a conversation with Grigorenko’s son the deputy chief doctor of the hospital, Kozhemyakina, stated that the death of P. G. Grigorenko would be the solution that would suit ‘everyone’.
In March 1974 the Action Group for the Defence of Human Rights in the USSR (T. Velikanova, S. Kovalyov, A. Krasnov-Levitin, G. Podyapolsky and T. Khodorovich) published an open letter in defence of Grigorenko. The letter said:
“… For the last five years the authorities have used every means to break P. Grigorenko — to force him to renounce his convictions, to admit they are the product of an illness … All forms of pressure have been fruitless. P. Grigorenko has not accepted their hints, and when they have made direct invitations that he renounce his convictions, he has rejected them.”
The authors affirm that “by exploiting the illusion of his impending release …, the authorities are aiming … to reduce people to silence”. Expressing the fear that “… life-long imprisonment in a mad-house has been prepared for Pyotr Grigorevich Grigorenko”, the Action Group calls on international public opinion to help P. Grigorenko, In the spring of 1974 Grigorenko’s health took a definite turn for the worse: he began to suffer frequent heart attacks.
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In a press statement issued on 2 May 1974, Zinaida and Andrei Grigorenko report that after a serious heart attack on 2 April the chief doctor of the hospital, Kozyrev, and the doctors of the section in which P. G. Grigorenko was being held informed the city psychiatrist Orlov and the Serbsky Institute in writing of the necessity of discharging Grigorenko as a physically seriously ill man, as his treatment could not be carried out in a proper way in a psychiatric hospital. In the same statement Z. M. and A. P. Grigorenko briefly reiterate the circumstances of Pyotr Grigorenko’s conviction and the deprivations, threats and slander to which he has been subjected for the entire five years of his imprisonment.
On the same day, 2 May, Z. M. Grigorenko answered the questions of Western correspondents.
At the beginning of May serious heart attacks recurred.
On 12 May 1974 a commission was convened which recommended the cessation of compulsory treatment for P. Grigorenko.
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On 24 June 1974 the Moscow City Court passed a resolution terminating compulsory treatment for P. Grigorenko.
Grigorenko’s relatives knew nothing about this court hearing. On 25 June the court’s decision was conveyed to the hospital. According to information available, the person entrusted with this task informed the administration that Grigorenko should be sent home not later than 10 o’clock on the morning of 26 June.
At 17.00 on 25 June P. Grigorenko’s wife received a phone call at home in which she was told to come for her husband the following morning. Only at that moment did she learn that the court had sat.
At 10 o’clock on the morning of 25 June P. G. Grigorenko was driven home. (It would not be uninteresting to learn what were the sources of information of those Western radio stations which as early as seven o’clock that morning reported that Grigorenko had left the hospital.) The same day Grigorenko’s flat was visited by Western correspondents. P. Grigorenko said to them: “During five years and two months of severe ordeals I have become very tired, especially as my health has collapsed, my heart in particular. I want to rest and to recover. I ask you to convey my profound thanks to the public, to absolutely all those people who have helped me to return to my family and thereby prolong my life.”
P. G. Grigorenko’s wife, Zinaida Mikhailovna Grigorenko, said:
“I am glad, but not completely happy, as I cannot but feel the pain of Vladimir Bukovsky’s mother and Leonid Plyushch’s wife, of all the mothers and wives whose dear ones are behind bars. I want to convey thanks to all the people who have supported me during these terrible years.”
A few days later Z. M. Grigorenko was summoned to a police station, where a KGB official strongly advised her to take her husband away to the countryside to rest.
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Plyushch still in Dnepropetrovsk SPH
It is now a year (since 15 July 1973) that the Kiev mathematician Leonid Plyushch has been held in the Dnepropetrovsk Special Psychiatric Hospital (CCE 29.6, CCE 30.9 [2]).
From August 1973 to January 1974 Plyushch was receiving large doses of haloperidol in tablet form, as a curative prescribed by doctors.
On 4 January, Plyushch had his next meeting with his wife. His condition was as before: almost all the time he sleeps; he cannot read or write; he does not go out for exercise as he would freeze. During the meeting he spoke slowly and little, but as previously he listened carefully and with interest; he answered questions briefly.
Dnepropetrovsk SPH (SC)
In February and March 1974, the haloperidol treatment was replaced by insulin injections in increasing doses. The team of psychiatrists which examined him at about this time considered it essential to continue Plyushch’s treatment. The members of the commission did not speak to Plyushch. L. A. Chasovskikh, Plyushch’s doctor, in response to a question from his wife about which precise symptoms of illness indicated the need to prolong her husband’s treatment, answered: “His views and beliefs”. She refused to answer further questions about diagnosis and treatment.
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At a meeting on 4 March 1974, Plyushch was unrecognizable. Great dropsical swelling had occurred, he moved with difficulty, and his eyes had lost their usual liveliness.
Plyushch said that the doctors were insisting that he renounce his views and beliefs, and definitely in written form. This he had refused to do.
A commission in April again recommended prolonging Plyushch’s stay in the Dnepropetrovsk hospital. The doctors asked Plyushch to write a detailed autobiography which would show clearly how his views had formed, and how he had developed his ‘delusional ideas’. Plyushch refused to write such an autobiography.
At a meeting on 12 May it was learnt that since April they had stopped giving Plyushch any drugs at all. Plyushch explained this by the fact that pains had developed in his abdominal cavity and the doctors had become scared. With the stopping of the drugs his condition improved: his swellings began to subside, his pains disappeared. Plyushch was transferred to a different ward, where there were fewer patients and it was quieter. He began to read again — true, now only belles-lettres, not scientific literature — and to write letters.
At a meeting on 29 May his wife learned that since 13 May her husband had begun again to be given insulin injections, again in increasing doses. Itching and an allergic rash developed, but the injections were not stopped. After each injection Plyushch was tied down to his bed. and it appeared as though by these injections they wanted to achieve an insulin shock.
On the same day (29 May) the commandant of the Dnepropetrovsk hospital, Pruss, spoke with Plyushch’s wife. He said Plyushch still needed treatment and his wife must help the doctors in this regard. “Your husband reads too much, you must not send him so many books: his sick brain must be spared. You must not forget this.”
In the course of the conversation it became clear that the reading of books in the hospital is strictly controlled and that Plyushch was being given very little to read. Letters from his close ones were being taken away as soon as he had read them, and he was not allowed to keep by him even a photograph of his wife and children.
Questions about what drugs Plyushch was being treated with, and in what doses, and whether they were trying to induce in him an insulin shock, were avoided by Pruss and his doctor, who referred to some directives or other, according to which they were not allowed to answer such questions.
At a meeting on 3 July 1974 Plyushch reported that in late June he had not been given insulin for seven or eight days, as he had had a cold. However, since 30 June they had recommenced the injections and after three or four days had again begun giving him a whole syringeful.
Plyushch reported that he had been examined by some commission of local doctors. The members of the commission had put three questions to him:
“How do you feel?”
“All right.”
“How does the insulin affect you?”
“It provokes an allergy.”
“How do you regard your former activities?”
“I regret that I got involved in them.”
The commission decided to prolong his treatment.
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It has become known that an International Committee of Mathematicians in Defence of Yury Shikhanovich and Leonid Plyushch has been founded [2]. The French subcommittee of this Committee publishes a bulletin. Bulletin No. 2 (Paris, 2 June 1974) lists, in particular, some of the members of the Committee, namely 54 scholars from the USA, Canada, England, France, Italy, Jerusalem, Switzerland and Japan. Amongst them are Berger, Cartan, Claude Chevalier, Claude Picard, Laurent Schwartz and A. Weil.
On 8 February 1974 a delegation from the French subcommittee visited the Soviet embassy in Paris in order to hand over a petition signed by 550 French mathematicians who are alarmed by the trial of Yu. Shikhanovich and the fact that he has been interned in a psychiatric hospital.
The scholars conversed with an embassy counsellor, Valentin Dvinin, and a secretary from the cultural section, Valery Matisov. The embassy had heard of Shikhanovich but not of Plyushch. One of the embassy officials explained to the mathematicians that a special psychiatric hospital was a high-class hospital, rather like those for Academicians. The mathematicians handed over for transmission to Shikhanovich some books by ‘the Bourbaki’, signed by some of the contributors to this famous publication.
On 25 March counsellor Dvinin sent a letter to Professor Henri Cartan which says, in particular, that the USSR Academy of Sciences, in response to an enquiry from the embassy about the fate of mathematicians Shikhanovich and Plyushch, had replied that “… these persons are not listed, and never have been, among the members of any Academy Institutes”, However, “… the appropriate bodies”, in reply to another embassy enquiry, had reported that “… Plyushch was dismissed from a scientific-research institute in Kiev in 1968 for negligence in his work and for losing official documents. He made no attempts to find himself a new job and, living off his wife’s earnings, engaged in writing and systematically duplicating manuscripts containing anti-Soviet material’. Then the official version of the criminal actions of Shikhanovich and Plyushch, the discovery of their mental illness, and their treatment is recounted in detail.
Dvinin reports that some of the participants in a symposium of the World Psychiatric Association which took place in the USSR, including Howard Rome, Ramon de la Fuente and Freedman, had on 15 October 1973 “… listened to a report on the history of Plyushch’s and Shikhanovich’s illnesses …” and “… did not express any doubts about the mental illness and consequent madness” … of both of them [3].
Dvinin wished to draw the attention of Cartan and his colleagues to the fact that “… sometimes serious scientists, on the basis of inaccurate information, allow themselves to become involved in a political campaign being waged by certain groups with the aim of impeding mutual understanding and cordial relations between the peoples of our countries”.
In connection with Dvinin’s reference to Doctors Freedman and Rome, Bulletin No. 2 of the French subcommittee quotes extracts from a declaration regarding Shikhanovich signed by a number of American psychiatrists and lawyers in November 1973:
“We are deeply disturbed by the fact that, on the basis of a previous psychiatric decision, he can be ruled mentally unbalanced and insane, whilst the available facts of witnesses tell of his complete mental sanity. We are deeply concerned that, as a consequence of this, fundamental principles both of psychiatric practice and of criminal law could be violated. We, who are familiar with Soviet specialists and have worked with them in the realm of psychiatry and law, call on you to dispel our anxiety by conducting an open trial of Shikhanovich and allowing foreign observers to be present.”
The declaration was signed by, amongst others; Dr Alfred Freedman, Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry of New York Medical College, and Dr Howard Rome, director of the Psychiatric Department of the Mayo Clinic. A, Freedman is also president of the American Psychiatric Association, and H. Rome is president of the World Psychiatric Association.
Bulletin No. 2 gives biographical information about Plyushch, quoting the 1972 letter about Plyushch from the Action Group for the Defence of Human Rights in the USSR. It reports on the condition of Plyushch in Dnepropetrovsk hospital and prints the text of the appeal by Bonner, Velikanova, Kovalyov, Sakharov, Khodorovich and Tverdokhlebov of 12 February 1974 (this issue CCE 32.22 item 8). The bulletin comments: “All the concern [about the health and life of Plyushch, Chronicle] expressed in this appeal is only too well grounded.”
The bulletin reports on the declaration of 17 mathematicians from the University of Provence in defence of Plyushch and on the fact that the initiative for a campaign in support of Plyushch has been assumed by psychiatrists Dr Gentis and Dr Torrubia [4].
The bulletin recommends a series of actions in defence of Plyushch, including: widespread circulation of information about him; collection of signatures under declarations in his defence (it recommends that declarations be sent to Soviet embassies and to the Dnepropetrovsk hospital); and mathematicians are advised to state their intention of going to the USSR for a meeting with Plyushch and to press hard for a visa.
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OTHER NEWS
At the beginning of March Vladimir Borisov [5] was released from Psychiatric Hospital No. 2 in Leningrad.
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Nikolai Plakhotnyuk from Kiev, who is in the Dnepropetrovsk SPH (CCE 28.7), was examined by a psychiatric commission in April. The results are as yet unknown.
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Vladimir Gershuni was transferred in April from the Oryol SPH to an ordinary psychiatric hospital in Moscow (Psychiatric Hospital No. 13). A psychiatric commission which met at the end of December 1973 decided that it was possible for him to be transferred to an ordinary hospital in March 1974; a court ruled that the transfer be made (on Gershuni see CCE 11.6, CCE 13.1, CCE 19.2).
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On 15 April Victor Fainberg (CCE 4.1, CCE 19.3, CCE 30.9 [5]) began a hunger strike in solidarity with V. Bukovsky and other political prisoners in the Perm camps [6].
On 30 April Fainberg was forcibly interned in a psychiatric hospital.
On 8 May Fainberg ended his hunger strike.
On 18 May he was released from the hospital. Fainberg left the Soviet Union in June of this year.
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At the beginning of July Yury Shikhanovich (CCE 27.2 [1], CCE 30.3) was released from psychiatric hospital No. 9 (Yakhroma, Moscow Region). The decision to terminate his compulsory treatment was taken by a psychiatric commission on 25 March 1974; the court hearing took place in June.
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The following were under psychiatric examination in the Serbsky Institute in January 1974:
- Heino Jogesma, born 1937 in Tallinn; crossed the border into Finland and was returned by the Finnish authorities. Ruled mentally ill.
- Vasily Trish (b. 1911), a collective farmer from Ternopol Region, Article 187-1 (UkSSR Criminal Code = Article 190-1, RSFSR Code). An in-patient psychiatric examination in Vinnitsa ruled that he was mentally ill; after this he was sent to the Serbsky Institute for examination.
- Nikolai Kopeiko from Grozny, Article 190-1 (RSFSR Criminal Code); underwent in-patient examination in Dnepropetrovsk, was then transferred to the Serbsky Institute. Ruled to be mentally ill.
- Artur Oganesyan from Leninakan. Escaped from the USSR and lived for a year and a half in Turkey and the USA. Gave an interview in Turkey. The circumstances and date of his return, as well as the date of his arrest, are not known to the Chronicle [7]. Charged under Article 64 of the RSFSR Criminal Code (“Betraying the Motherland”). Possible that he was transferred to the Serbsky Institute from a place of imprisonment. Ruled to be a malingerer.
- Grachev (b. 1939), from Simferopol, worked as a foreman on a building site. Article 190-1 (RSFSR Criminal Code). Ruled to be non-accountable.
- Ivan Kuzmin from Lipetsk, about 40 years old, Article 190-1 (RSFSR Criminal Code). Ruled to be non-accountable.
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NOTES
- On Grigorenko, see CCE 12.2, CCE 14.2; CCE 16.9, CCE 24.11 [16] and Name Index.
↩︎ - The committee’s secretary is Dr M. Brouc, Montcreau, France. The committee, which seeks broad support, publishes regular bulletins in both English and French.
↩︎ - In a subsequent issue of the Committee’s bulletin Professor Freedman published a categoric denial of this statement.
↩︎ - See the statement by Dr Roger Gentis and Dr Horace Torrubia in Le Nouvel Observateur, Paris (5-11 November 1973).
↩︎ - On Vladimir Borisov, see CCE 11.10, CCE 19.3, CCE 24.4, CCE 30.9 [5] and Name Index.
↩︎ - Simultaneously Fainberg circulated a long statement of solidarity which was widely published in the West.
↩︎ - Oganesyan returned to the USSR in 1973.
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A Chronicle of Current Events 