The Bulletin of the Council of Baptist Prisoners’ Relatives in the USSR (No. 25) reports:
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KAZAKHSTAN
In February 1975 five searches were carried out at the homes of believers in the town of Zyryanovsk.
On 2 May 1975 police in the town of Shchuchinsk (Kokchetav Region), led by Lieutenant-Colonel Chekushin and Captain Kinzhitayev, tried to disperse a prayer-meeting of German Baptists held at the home of P. Ya. Zimens. The believers succeeded in keeping the police out of the house. After the meeting many were detained at the railway station. On the evening of the same day Zimens was arrested.
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The procurator’s office in the town of Uman (Ukraine) has initiated proceedings to deprive the Muzyka couple of their parental rights over their ten children (from one to 14 years old).
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The Bulletin publishes in this issue:
- protests against the destruction of the printing press of the Baptists’ Christian publishing house (CCE 34.12);
- a declaration signed by 522 people, protesting against the Orthodox Easter Day (4 May) being made a working day;
- a list of reform Baptists [Initsiativniki] in prison on 1 June 1975. There are 110 names on the list, 70 of them arrested in 1973-1974; 25 of them are serving their second term, eight their third term, and two their fourth term.
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At the beginning of June [in fact on 27 June] 1975 the women printing workers of the Baptists’ “Christian” publishing house (CCE 34.12) were released: E. I. Gritsenko, Z. P. Tarasova, I. D. Korotun (or Korotunova), T. S. Kozhemyakina and N. G. Lvova.
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UKRAINE
On 14 May 1975 KGB officials arrested the Seventh Day Adventist Nikifor Nikolayevich CHERNOV (b. 1905) in the town of Kramatorsk (Donetsk Region).
The arrest was preceded by the search of a container, carried out on the orders of the Samarkand KGB Administration. As a result a great deal of religious literature was confiscated (Bibles in particular), together with a tape recorder and tapes of psalms. After Chernov was arrested, he was apparently taken to Samarkand, which he and his wife had just left.
In the Stalin era Chernov was imprisoned for 10 years under Articles 58-10 and 58-11 (of the Stalin-era Criminal Code).
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In September 1974 the Kirovograd Regional Court sentenced Maryan Tsobulsky to 5 years in strict-regime camps, under Article 209 (UkSSR Criminal Code: “Infringement of the person and rights of citizens under the pretext of performing religious rites” = Article 227, RSFSR Code).
Tsobulsky is a graduate of a higher-education institute, has taught Ukrainian language and literature, and at one time was a headmaster. He is about 50 years old. After the war he served 10 years under Article 58 of the old criminal code and then 4 more years at the beginning of the 1960s. He is a Jehovah’s Witness.
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In the village of Stavchany (Khotin district, Chernovitsky Region) during the funeral of Trofim Chaglei, the local leader of a congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, one of the speakers was arrested. His name is not known to the Chronicle.
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RELIGIOUS UPBRINGING
The Education Department of Starosinyavsky district (Khmelnitsky Region) has started court proceedings to deprive Marla Ivanovna VLASYUK, living in the village of Ilyatki, of her parental rights over her two children — Svetlana (10 years old) and Viktor (6).
Vlasyuk belongs to the Seventh-Day Adventist religion. The case against her was started because she encourages her children to take part in religious services and refuses to let Svetlana go to school on Saturdays. This religious education has led, according to the District Education Department, to Svetlana’s being isolated from the school’s social life and generally being ’deprived of childish toys’. It was maintained that the little girl’s weak health was also caused by her “participation in religious sectarianism”.
On 16 April 1975 the people’s court of the Starosinyavsky district decided to take Svetlana away from her mother and hand her over to the care of the welfare authorities, but without depriving Maria Ivanovna of parental rights. As for six-year-old Viktor, the court decided to leave him with his mother.
An appeal y M. I. Vlasyuk was turned down. In its decision of 27 May the Khmelnitsky Regional Court relied, in particular, on Articles 61 & 64 of the UkSSR law on Marriage and the Family, which imposes on parents the duty of bringing up their children in the spirit of the moral code of the builders of communism.
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On 8 June M. I. Vlasyuk complained to the Supreme Court of the Ukrainian SSR. In her complaint she refers to Soviet and international law and also asserts her natural right to bring up her own child. She categorically denies that Svetlana has suffered physical or moral harm from her upbringing.
The Chronicle does not have the precise facts but it seems that in June or July the Supreme Court upheld the decisions of the Regional and district courts.
On 15 July representatives of the district police arrived at Vlasyuk’s home. They asked to see Svetlana, saying they had heard that Maria Ivanovna had ‘sacrificed her as a victim’. They even handed over a written statement that they would not ‘remove the child Svetlana Vlasyuk from her parents until the decision of the court takes legal effect’.
The mother brought the child. The police chief began to disperse the crowd that had gathered and to shout at M. I. Vlasyuk. Bystanders tried to shame him, saying, ‘This is how the Germans took our children away’.
Several officials ran up to Svetlana. The little girl became frightened and began to run away. One of the visitors, a certain Melnik, ran after her. The mother fainted. After this the police quickly drove away.
No further news of the fate of the Vlasyuk family is available.
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A Chronicle of Current Events 